Martial Arts and Military

[theletch1]

I think all the military is the same whatever country lol! I had a soldier come in the other day who wants to train with us, the recruiting office had told him he'd get time off to train ( he's BB TKD and Shotokan) but of course his unit just laughed when he asked. i've heard lot os similiar stories of people who wanted to be engineers, mechanics etc and being told to join the infantry first as 'they can always transfer', yeah right!
Reading orders and suchlike here they are asking for volunteers for people to learn Farsi and Arabic languages. Seems you have to be already in service before they'll take you on and teach you ..

On a side note a friend of mine became a signing for the deaf translator, it took a lot of time and a university degree but she gets paid now about £75 an hour to tanslate in courts, hospitals, tv studios etc. As well as being well paid she says it's a very enjoyable job,you get paid to make peoples lifes easier!

When I joined up it was with a "guaranteed" contract as an 0311... basic infantry. It's what I wanted. I'd seen one too many John Wayne movies. During the first 72 hours of boot camp we had to take a huge battery of tests and one of them was an imaginary language test. My scores were high enough to get me called in for a "request" to change my contracted MOS to 2674. When signing up for duty stations after school you had your choice of 3... and then got the one that suited the "Good of the Corps". As I said before, it'll depend on your unit and how much down time you have. Given the high tempo of operations at the moment for the US military you'd have to find time as it came and not look to having a regular class schedule or a standing group of students.

 

[GuroJason]

I think all the military is the same whatever country lol! I had a soldier come in the other day who wants to train with us, the recruiting office had told him he'd get time off to train ( he's BB TKD and Shotokan) but of course his unit just laughed when he asked. i've heard lot os similiar stories of people who wanted to be engineers, mechanics etc and being told to join the infantry first as 'they can always transfer', yeah right!
Reading orders and suchlike here they are asking for volunteers for people to learn Farsi and Arabic languages. Seems you have to be already in service before they'll take you on and teach you ..

On a side note a friend of mine became a signing for the deaf translator, it took a lot of time and a university degree but she gets paid now about £75 an hour to tanslate in courts, hospitals, tv studios etc. As well as being well paid she says it's a very enjoyable job,you get paid to make peoples lifes easier!

That's the same reason I want to be an interpreter, too. I want to help people understand each other.

 

[GuroJason]

So the general theme from this forum seems to be that the military would NOT be the easy way out for getting interpreter certification. I'd be better off saving up for tuition at the Monterey Institute or, well even San Francisco State University has a certificate program for less than 5 grand. I should just go there! That'd be handy because Pallen's Senkotiros is pretty grounded in the Bay Area.

 

[theletch1]

So the general theme from this forum seems to be that the military would NOT be the easy way out for getting interpreter certification. I'd be better off saving up for tuition at the Monterey Institute or, well even San Francisco State University has a certificate program for less than 5 grand. I should just go there! That'd be handy because Pallen's Senkotiros is pretty grounded in the Bay Area.

Yes. Especially right now. If you're going to join the military then a specific specialty should be your secondary reason for joining.

 

[Tez3]

Our club is in a barracks and while we welcome civvies and have a couple as students, the main reason apart from enjoying it that we do MMA is that the military students can still train. We have no curriculum so can train according to whoever we have in. We can have students come in for a few weeks then they disappear for six months or more on deployment, we haven't, touch wood, lost a student yet but one of our pro fighters is a PTI at the Infantry Training Centre and is from 2 Para who took so many casualties, the younger ones were all his trainees, a couple of the older ones were friends.
I've just started a TSD class for adult beginners, the students I have are from a tank regiment (The Queens Royal Lancers, the Death or Glory boys), they're doing their tours as squadrons, the guys I've got have done theirs (they lost two soldiers) so I'll have them for 2 years before they go to Germany permanently. They still have duties though. Sometimes I have a few sometimes none, makes it hard to get the training in for grading. We are hoping a couple of them will manage their black belts or at least red so they can start a club over there that we can go across to and help train grade etc.
We can only run the club though because I am permanently stationed here (I hope lol) it would be very difficult to do so otherwise. I've seen other things like scout groups etc close on other camps because the leaders were posted and there was no one to take over, usually though you could persuade a parent to train and take over until they in turn were posted. Much harder with something like martial arts to find someone to take over.

An MMA club is a bit easier to keep going as you can find martial artists from all disciplines to come and train when they don't have their own clubs to go to. Gradings and lessons aren't a problem, you get a group of like minded martial artists and get to keep your hand in at least.

 

[Rich Parsons]

TS-SCI clearance. Expect about six months of investigators talking to everyone from your family to your high school teachers and asking you the same question a dozen times to see if you change your answer. It's really a fun field to be in if you're into languages.

After college, I had a friend go into the Naval Program for Nuclear. They ahd to do a TS background check on him. I also was working fro a defense contractor and they were doing a clearance check on me.

The funny thing I bring up here (* Off topic *), was that it was about 6 months and one guy actually started putting both me and my friend and some of our mutual friends who had been in the military all on his list to call and check and double check. Finally he asked me one day, with all of you in the same room or hanging out what do you guys all talk about if it is not work. I told him, We are all into war games, with minatures and also board games, where we get to build empires and play against each other. He just laughed, and said that common interest explained why some many of us with different positions or ex-positions were either cleared or inactive in our clearances. BTW: I got my paperwork a week later.

The issue is be honest, what they are looking for is something you would want to hide. Good luck in finding the right path.

 

[Tez3]

Security clearance doesn't reveal everything though.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7754981.stm

 

[GuroJason]

Our club is in a barracks and while we welcome civvies and have a couple as students, the main reason apart from enjoying it that we do MMA is that the military students can still train. We have no curriculum so can train according to whoever we have in. We can have students come in for a few weeks then they disappear for six months or more on deployment, we haven't, touch wood, lost a student yet but one of our pro fighters is a PTI at the Infantry Training Centre and is from 2 Para who took so many casualties, the younger ones were all his trainees, a couple of the older ones were friends.
I've just started a TSD class for adult beginners, the students I have are from a tank regiment (The Queens Royal Lancers, the Death or Glory boys), they're doing their tours as squadrons, the guys I've got have done theirs (they lost two soldiers) so I'll have them for 2 years before they go to Germany permanently. They still have duties though. Sometimes I have a few sometimes none, makes it hard to get the training in for grading. We are hoping a couple of them will manage their black belts or at least red so they can start a club over there that we can go across to and help train grade etc.
We can only run the club though because I am permanently stationed here (I hope lol) it would be very difficult to do so otherwise. I've seen other things like scout groups etc close on other camps because the leaders were posted and there was no one to take over, usually though you could persuade a parent to train and take over until they in turn were posted. Much harder with something like martial arts to find someone to take over.

An MMA club is a bit easier to keep going as you can find martial artists from all disciplines to come and train when they don't have their own clubs to go to. Gradings and lessons aren't a problem, you get a group of like minded martial artists and get to keep your hand in at least.

That sounds pretty awesome, actually. I guess MMA would be easier to do, like you said, because you wouldn't scare people away because you don't do their specific art.

I was thinking of renting a local gym or something off base. I guess I was really stretching when I thought of Military as a possibility. Hey I know, I can whore myself out as an interpreter for people that want to teach seminars in Spanish speaking countries. Anybody want to go to Venezuela?

 

[arnisador]

Especially right now. If you're going to join the military then a specific specialty should be your secondary reason for joining.

Agreed.

There are other options--college, the Foreign Service (a looooong shot), etc.

 

[Tez3]

How about the French Legion D'Etranger?

 

[arnisador]

They only accept folks from French-speaking countries these days. Times change!

 

[jks9199]

How about the French Legion D'Etranger?

Well, you'd definitely learn French!

 

[Tez3]

And sing. I love their singing!

The forces here will sponsor suitable candidates through uni on the understanding they sign up for a certain amount of years. usually about six. One of my civvie students is doing that with the Navy, he goes to uni next year, do the American services do anything similiar?

 

[SA_BJJ]

Jason,

I will respond to your message in a bit more depth, but I have to say....and I really hate to be the rain on the proverbial parade here....but the Air Force or DoD in general is the wrong place to be looking if you're interested in Spanish. Languages are broken down into "classes" in the DoD that are determined based on current availability (how many people speak it), how much we need it (mission requirements), and difficulty of the language. As you can expect, Spanish barely rates a level. We have basically unlimited Spanish speakers and very little mission requirement for it. That combined with the fact that it is relatively easy means that they really don't train many linguists in it.

As far as I know, the DLI Spanish area does mainly just in time training for people who are deploying to Spanish speaking countries or for law enforcement or agents in areas with large Spanish speaking populations.

Of course...I'm an Air Force Engineer, so I could be WAY off, but I have a Navy friend who just graduated from DLI, I'll e-mail him to ask.

If you are interested in Farsi....I'm sure that you'd have no problem getting in.

Also...if you do enter the Military with the intention of being a linguist, you have to remember that 1) NEVER EVER EVER believe a recruiter because 2) The job that you get is based primarily on the needs of the military and a far behind second...what you actually want to do. The same goes with what language you would be assigned to. Plus, you have the pass the DLPT, Defense Language Proficiency Test. You have to already be good at the language you want to go in to.

You are actually way off on the Spanish liguist area...Spanish is actually one of the 5 most needed languages. Its not a fact of knowing spanish, but knowing proper English. While it is true we have an ungodly amount of spanish speaking members in the AF we do not have alot of Spanish speaking members that also read write and speak proper english.

Also, you dont have to have prior knowledge of a language in order to be a liguist in the language. That is what DLI is for.

 

[jks9199]

And sing. I love their singing!

The forces here will sponsor suitable candidates through uni on the understanding they sign up for a certain amount of years. usually about six. One of my civvie students is doing that with the Navy, he goes to uni next year, do the American services do anything similiar?

They do it in a few different ways. The most common would be one of the Reserve Officer Training Corps scholarships. ROTC is held at many universities and colleges, and consists of weekly classes, some drill time, and summer training, though a few colleges and universities (like The Citadel, VMI, and Virginia Tech) have "full time" ROTC where the cadets live under military discipline throughout the school year. Students typically owe several years of service after graduation in return for their scholarship money.

There are also the US military colleges (West Point/USMA, The US Naval Academy, The Air Force Academy, and The Coast Guard Academy) where students are actually members of the service. They then owe a term of service after graduation, and are somewhat expected or encouraged to look towards a military career.

The US military also has it's own med school, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, along with the War College.

In some cases, as I understand it, a service member also may be detached and sent to a college or university for specific programs of benefit to the services, as well. I believe they generally owe a service commitment after graduation, as well.

 

[MBuzzy]

You are actually way off on the Spanish liguist area...Spanish is actually one of the 5 most needed languages. Its not a fact of knowing spanish, but knowing proper English. While it is true we have an ungodly amount of spanish speaking members in the AF we do not have alot of Spanish speaking members that also read write and speak proper english.

Wow, that is surprising! I didn't think that they were sending anyone to DLI for Spanish - did it go back on the Strategic Languages List? Do you know what class it is? Is it Immediate Investment or Stronghold? Any idea when it went off of the "Language Dominant in the Force" list? I've actually had some troops that were fluent in Spanish and English that could never get FLPP or go to DLI to cross train as an interpreter.

I've been looking for the list for a while, because I would love to take the FLPP for Korean at some point and start collecting for it....but I dont' even know what class Korean is. It used to be Class B, but then I saw that it is one of the highest levels on the DLAB.

Also, you dont have to have prior knowledge of a language in order to be a liguist in the language. That is what DLI is for.

You're right, I just did some reading and it turns out, you don't take the DLPT, you take the DLAB (Defense Language Aptitude Battery). Which determines how easily you can learn you can learn a language. That's based on the 4 categories of language difficulty.

 

[SA_BJJ]

Wow, that is surprising! I didn't think that they were sending anyone to DLI for Spanish - did it go back on the Strategic Languages List? Do you know what class it is? Is it Immediate Investment or Stronghold? Any idea when it went off of the "Language Dominant in the Force" list? I've actually had some troops that were fluent in Spanish and English that could never get FLPP or go to DLI to cross train as an interpreter.

I've been looking for the list for a while, because I would love to take the FLPP for Korean at some point and start collecting for it....but I dont' even know what class Korean is. It used to be Class B, but then I saw that it is one of the highest levels on the DLAB.



You're right, I just did some reading and it turns out, you don't take the DLPT, you take the DLAB (Defense Language Aptitude Battery). Which determines how easily you can learn you can learn a language. That's based on the 4 categories of language difficulty.

I am honestly unsure as to the timeframe, I have two Spanish linguists in my class right now and this comes from them...didnt really get too specific. As for Korean, I dont know why you wouldnt get paid a grip for that.

 

[Guardian]

If you are interested in Farsi....I'm sure that you'd have no problem getting in.

That's not to say that Spanish is not needed, but we are not at war with them or after Spanish terrorist at this present time. You might get in, I'm wasn't into that type of thing, but I can guarantee you, the push for you won't be spanish, it will be what is listed above for that is where our military is going to be involved in for a long time to come. Just my view.