Re-rated

[Itzhakway]

I need to talk to someone who was re-rated in the navy.
Anyone on this board?

[Roll Tide]

Do you mean actually attained one rate and then changed? Or do you mean changed to another path before attaining a rate. I mean, you can't be changed from EM to MM unless you have been an MM...

Anyway, I don't know of anyone who has been re-rated from one nuke rating to another nuke rating since they phased out the BT / EN / IC nukes from the earlier days of Navy Nukes (though I worked for an IC nuke and a former EN nuke).

I guess we need more info before we can answer.

[Itzhakway]

I mean if someone sign as a Janitor (for example only) and immediately after boot camp apply for ET or EM,  and he is qualify, will he be re-rated? What is the procedure? How long it takes?

[shayne]

I don't have any specifics and I don't know the details, but to change rates, you would have to be in a rate that is over-manned and cross rate into a rate that is undermanned.  I seem to remember also that some Navy rates, such as Navy Career Councilor and Master-at-arms, are positions that you have to be re-rated to get.  Generally we were told that Nukes wouldn't be allowed to change rates, However, I have seen students fail out of the training pipeline and get new 'A' schools (ET about 99% of the time).  There was an ET/RO on the ship that was de-nuked, he really wanted to make a career out of the Navy, that was able to get a new 'A' School.

[Itzhakway]

"How did your visit with the Airforce and Army work out?"
Both promise the stars, yet I want to be a hi-tech sailor.

"I love the effort your putting in....but, don't settle for anything less than the ultimate prize if that is what you want."
I failed the ISHIHARA test. I can train myself to pass it. For work in school and on board, I can get civilian glasses that will correct my color deficiency ($4-5,000) and see normal colors. The military does not issue color correction glasses and I am worried that in school or aboard I will not be allowed to use them, therefore I won’t be able to perform my work to perfection. With the glasses, I will ace school and work on board a ship or in a sub.

What I need to know is if I'll be allowed to use civilian tinted glasses in school and on board.

[Fermi2]

I'm not sure about onboard. When I was in we had to wear Navy ones that would fit under an MSA, SCBA and whatever that other thing was we had to wear with the scorching cannisters.

Oh and when I was in I served with two guys who had rerated. One was a Personnelman who bacame an MM. He went to ELT school with me. The other was a BT, who became a Nuke ET.
We also had one Ex Army Ordinance Specialist another was ex Airforce.

Mike

[ChiefRocscooter]

As others have said, I like your effot and attitude but..... the Navy is like a big dinasour most of the time.  For example when I was a recruiter in mid-nineties you could not join if you had RK surgery on your eyes. Period no waiver zip nada zilch!!!  Now the Navy performs the surgery, and in fact the call around to ships and commands looking for people who want to get it!!  What I am trying to tell you is that you have little chance, based on what everyone says is written, but there was likely a first person allowed in with RK so do not give up!  Ask to talk to the district nuke recruiter and see if you can get him on your side, he can call higherups in DC (and TN nowadays) and maybe they will look at your situation.  All you can do is ask (do not be afraid to push to talk to them your self (write a letter make it sound good!)  People who tell you no can't be done often do it with out asking the next level up! 
Case in point, when I was a 26 yr old sailor I took the SAT because my command volunteered me to some Navy campus test/study they were doing on the waterfront (command were supposed to ramdomly pick 3 or 4 sailors).  Long story short I got a 1450 and was quickely told I was shoe in for ROTC scholarship, "no doubt, you got it ect.." . They put me on phone to Area Rotc coordinator/recruiter and he says I'm sorry your six months to old!!  about ten years later I am working for this great CAPT who makes a point of knowing his Chiefs personnaly, he sees my record and wants to know why with score like that and my record I did not try for commission?  I tell him and he says B@#$ $h!t, seems he was a head Officer Detailer in Miilngton TN (where the personnel HQ is) and he said every rule is bent(broke) from time to time!  Had I put in hew said I would have been approved!! (lesson learned???)
Like I said do not give up till you have taken it as high as you can go!!  Line up your duck and start shooting!!!

Good Luck
Rob

[Itzhakway]

Yes, I called Petty Officer Harris and wrote a letter to LT Adam Glenn, both in Millington, TN, asking for waiver, or exception, or authorization for civilian glasses, but to no avail. I even constructed a letter to The Honorable Donald C. Winter, Secretary of the Navy, 1000 Navy Pentagon, Washington, D.C., but didn’t send it yet.
What else can I do?

[BuddyThePug]

What else can I do?

Get used to the fact that you arent going to be a nuke, and either:

 1. take some of the excellent advice that experienced people took the time to give you or
 2. pick another rating
 3. don't join at all

Virtually all of your previous dozen or so posts revolve around this issue. Lots of people have given encouragement and advice. The color requirement is there for a reason, your safety AND your shipmates. If you don't have your magic glasses and close a breaker based on mistaking green for red...it can hazard the equipment or other people's lives.

It doesn't make you less of a person to not have passing color vision. There are lots of technically advanced fields where you could work in the Navy, or other branches of service, as posters here have mentioned. Please respect the value of the time and effort that other people have put into replying thoughtfully to your questions.

[Itzhakway]

I appreciate the time you took to express your views, but I suspect you did not read ChiefRoscooter post above. Please read it, if you have the time.
As for the “Magic Glasses”, they are very real, in the forms of glasses, or contact lenses, provided by http://www.azmaneye.com/about.htm.
Why “Magic glasses”? Would you call vision deficiency corrective glasses also Magic Glasses?

On the light side, your calling the Color Deficiency Correction Glasses “Magic Glasses”, reminds me the famous remark of Shaka Zulu, in the 19 century, when he was first shown vision deficiency correction glasses, he dismissed them, saying: : “Those who use these glasses don’t want to see the real world”. Ignorance is a bliss, is it not?

[Rad Sponge]

Dude,

You have to understand that although the Nuclear Navy is "advanced technology", the beauracracy that governns it is not. It is chock full of rules and regulations and loopholes and circular arguments and all kinds of hooey all in effort to keep reactors from melting down. It seems to have worked for the last 100 million miles of steaming.

You have two beauracratic monsters against you: Nuke Land and Medical Land. One is bad enough, two is just ludicrously tough to negotiate with.

Nothing against you personally, but eventhough color deficiency glasses may be FDA/AMA approved, to the nuclear-medical mafioso, they are "magic glasses".

Most of everything you turn, switch, or press in the Nuclear Navy is color coded.

Thats just the way it is.

R/ Jason