"My Nuclear Family"

[Neutron Whisperer]

I did searches for "Brownfield" and "My Nuclear Family" and came up with nothing, so I'm posting this because I just found out about today.


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/22/books/22book.html

and

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-09-22/the-submarine-nuclear-scandal/

[NHSparky]

I'm being as nice as possible when I say the guy is a tool.

[Gamecock]

I'm being as nice as possible when I say the guy is a tool.

I work with someone who served with him.....first class tool is the official word.

[Duchess]

He might be a tool but he's a sexy tool.  Check out his flowing locks of highlighted hair on the NY Times article...mmmm

[Gamecock]

I'm being as nice as possible when I say the guy is a tool.

You can read more here

http://bubbleheads.blogspot.com/

-or here--

http://thisainthell.us/blog/?p=20574

[SA82]

I work with someone who served with him.....first class tool is the official word.

I served with him. He is definitely a tool. He was also one of the worst Junior Officers I have ever met. He posted the article online to coincide with his book release. If he was really trying to be a "whistle blower" in order to do some good, he would have written the article 2 years ago when he left the navy.

[Gamecock]

I served with him. He is definitely a tool. He was also one of the worst Junior Officers I have ever met. He posted the article online to coincide with his book release. If he was really trying to be a "whistle blower" in order to do some good, he would have written the article 2 years ago when he left the navy.

Or if he really had cajones....2.5 years ago when he was still in.

[shocker]

Could anyone enlighten a future nub why tests that should have a well defined scope must be altered on a seemingly regular basis?  It seems that rather than tuning the tests you would prefer to tune the training to attempt to obtain a 100% pass rate, rather than ensure your test looked hard enough.

I know you can't use the same version year after year, but it seems like with a test bank of X questions that seldom changed, you could randomly select Y questions for variation.  That way you could ensure different tests while still using a standardized grading metric.

[MMM]

shocker, we have two types of exams.

First are qualification exams, which gage you're level of knowledge about a particular watchstation. It's not always realistic to expect 100% passing on these. Partly because the exams sometimes ask things that may not be important during day to day ops or even most casualties, but might come up once in a while, plus some people are rocks or poor test takers. Also people sometimes misread the question and give a great answer to the wrong question.

Second are countinuous training exams, which typically come from training you've had over the last month or two and weak areas from previous exams. Personally, I see no reason why there's not a pass rate of at least 90% on these (again, rocks and poor test takers), assuming the questions were covered in training. This is actually something that my last ship was working toward, and, as can be expected, the test scores started going up. All we would get is the topics covered and recently failed areas to study.

Yes, some people do cheat on both of these, most fall into a grey area by asking the proctor to rephrase the question (who then might rephrase in the form af an answer). I've personally asked which version of the question it was, since I'd seen the same question three times with three different answers (and given all three answers). As it turns out, if that happens you're supposed to write several pages for a 4 point question, since the proctor shouldn't answer that, there was an AIRPAC monitor for this particular test.

Then you have the ORSE/MTT exams which come from all the questions on the CTEs from the last six months. Sure, it's possible to cheat, but you're likely to be caught during the oral interviews.

[HydroDave63]

He might be a tool but he's a sexy tool.  Check out his flowing locks of highlighted hair on the NY Times article...mmmm

posted like a true sub sailor!

Almost thought you were referring to Dave Warren there .....

[93-383]

I'll have to read the book (if I can find the time) but some of those quotes I herd on a regular basis.

"never let knowledge get in the way of qualification."

"your learning too much"

"just push through with lots of look ups you can learn this stuff later"

From my 1999-2009 perspective the nuclear navy is not the "elite" group of sailors it portrays it's self to be. Yes there are many exceptional people in this field. Some of the best people I've ever worked with where part of that program. At the same time many of the worst people I've worked with where part of that program.

[MMM]

The nuclear navy is a lot like any other organization. We have a pretty similar spead of awesomeness and dirt bags. The difference is, it's harder to get rid of the dirt bags in the navy unless they go out and break laws and it's hard to reward the awesome ones, as they're the competent ones that keep the screws going roundy-roundy.

[JsonD13]

It's not that hard to reward the competent ones, thats a good reason for medals.  Of course any reward loses its value when given to someone who does not really deserve it, like a NAM for cleaning bilges.

Jason

[stownsend]

I'll have to read the book (if I can find the time) but some of those quotes I herd on a regular basis.[/u] Some of the best people I've ever worked with where part of that program. At the same time many of the worst people I've worked with where part of that program.

Using Nukes as shepards has always been a hard job to fill especially after they came out with that movie about herding sheep.

[93-383]

From my 1980-1988 perspective,...it was,....



(let the dggit bashing begin)

I imagine it probably was back then.  Early 1980's economy would have provided many qualified people to choose from, NNPTC probably had its famous 50% failure rate back then. I think the failure rate for NNPTC-NPTU was less than 2% when I went through.

I had a friend that failed half the tests at NNPTC (got some back on the re-grade) failed NNPTC comp Failed NPTU comp. Failed first NPTU board. Lasted less than two years in the fleet before having NEC removed.

Perhaps the current economic climate will help restore some of the quality in the program but I doubt it.

The navy is starting to follow the same trend the civilian work force is, trading quality people for expensive technology. Automating processes to replace intelligent (expensive) people with inexpensive (dumb) people.

[Neutron Whisperer]

An officer on my boat served with the author.  They called him "Brownstain".

When he's called a tool, is that supposed to mean as the Urban Dictionary defines tool:

A person, typically male, who says or does things that cause you to give them a 'what-are-you-even-doing-here' look. The 'what-are-you-even-doing-here' look is classified by a glare in the tool's direction and is usually accompanied by muttering of how big of a tool they are. The tool is usually someone who is unwelcome but no one has the balls to tell them to get lost. The tool is alwasys making comments that are out-of-place, out-of-line or just plain stupid. The tool is always trying too hard to fit in, and because of this, never will. However, the tool is useful because you can use them for things; money, rides, ect.

Or is he someone trying to enforce the standards on those who want none of it?

Just making sure we're being specific.