NNPTC? What has changed since I was in?

[DLGN25]

NNPTC?  
What has changed since I was in?
Nuke designated enlisted were trained in this order.  Boot camp, MM, EM, or ET "A" school, then on to Nuclear "B" school which consisted of six months classroom training, then six months prototype, which included more general and rate specific classroom training, as well as in-plant watch qualifications.  An ET nuke hit the fleet as an E-5 with a little over 2 years in, most then made E-6 in a little over four.  When I was in, only ET's stood RO watches, whether shutdown or steaming.  A nuke ET advanced by taking the same rate exams as conventional ET's.  Nice, to make ETR1, you were tested on air search radars and other equipment you have never seen.

[GoLonghorns]

A couple of things have changed since your day.  NNPTC is no longer in Orlando.  The A school, Power School, and prototype sequence is still the same.  Most ET's still hit the fleet with a little over 2 years in, but most are still E-4's.  ET's still stand RO/SRO, but EM's qualify SRO and stand it sometimes, some more than others based on command.  Granted this is for a CVN, not sure about subs.  The rating exams have since changed, although I rememeber taking conventional rating exams as well.  But now there is ETN tests, so that is much better, however it seems you need to know an awful about sub plants as a surface nuke.  How else would you make a good leader on a carrier if you didn't know the spec on a 688?  /end sarcasm 

[x633ro]

NNPTC?  
What has changed since I was in?
Nuke designated enlisted were trained in this order.  Boot camp, MM, EM, or ET "A" school, then on to Nuclear "B" school which consisted of six months classroom training, then six months prototype, which included more general and rate specific classroom training, as well as in-plant watch qualifications.  An ET nuke hit the fleet as an E-5 with a little over 2 years in, most then made E-6 in a little over four.  When I was in, only ET's stood RO watches, whether shutdown or steaming.  A nuke ET advanced by taking the same rate exams as conventional ET's.  Nice, to make ETR1, you were tested on air search radars and other equipment you have never seen.

is an ETR1? I believe your showing your age......

[sovbob]

...But now there is ETN tests, so that is much better, however it seems you need to know an awful about sub plants as a surface nuke.  How else would you make a good leader on a carrier if you didn't know the spec on a 688?  /end sarcasm 

Your complaint is a common one.  Why should a surface nuke need to know about submarines and vice versa?  I was a little annoyed about those questions featuring A4W plants, since I was a fast-attack guy myself. Fortunately, the navy in its infinite bureaucracy has come up with a solution.

When a person takes an advancement exam (let's just use ETN1 for example), every single ET1 candidate takes the same exam.   They evaluate the test answers and give you an exam score.  However, you are only competing against other candidates within your community.  That means that although target carrier nukes get asked questions about submarines, they aren't competing against submarine ET's.

So why not just make a separate exam for targets carriers, and one for submarines?  Because the navy decided it would be easier to have a single exam, instead of one for each platform.  Also, where do you draw the line?  There are significant differences even between platforms of the same kind.  Should CVN nukes be given an advantage on the test over CVNX nukes?  Should they make an exam for every single platform, for every single rate?  You can quickly see how the complexity would get out of hand.

If you look at the advancements (available on the CNET's website, I believe), you will see that there are multiple "groups" that have different advancement percentages.  Group 1 is submarines and Group 2 is targets carriers, I believe.  There's also a Group 3 for students in the training pipeline.

Sorry if this is a little off-topic...

[DLGN25]

Actually, I am older then dirt.  Boot camp 1966 and ET A school at Great Lakes, NPS at Mare Island, Vallejo CA, then on to West Milton for prototype (D1G for me), then the fleet (Bainbridge just finishing up her first refueling at Mare Island).  

Given there were only 4 nuke surface ships at the time, your choice was the Truxtun, Bainbridge, Big E, or the Long Beach.  Duty rotation was two years sea then two years shore.  You guys seem to have it harder now then then.  

Oh, back then there was only ETC (communications) and ETR (Radar, TACAN,...).  ET's were also trained in electronic warfare equipment and encryption equipment. 

The ETN designation seems like a good idea as long as there is a large enough pool to allow advancement.  While the ETC and ETR tests had nothing to do with nuclear power, there was a vast pool of people and openings for advancement fleet wide.  Couple that with the extra points you got for being a nuke, rapid promotion was the norm, but it did create top heavy RC divisions.  At the time, there was no extra money for nuclear NEC's, so they compensated with promotions.