How much leave time

[shifty.07]

is given between A-School and NNPS? 

[EasyLivin]

Depends on your "class up". I would not expect any leave. You may get leave for a holiday stand-down. If not there is t-track (I believe that is what they call it these days), where you wait for your clearance before you class up. But still, if you are on hold, you will be standing quarterdeck watch or working nights cleaning the site. Are you at NNPTC right now?

[sovbob]

When I went through (2002-2003) we had 2 weeks of grad leave after A-school, 2 weeks of leave after power school, and 30 days of leave after prototype.  That was not including Christmas standdown, which was 2 weeks.

No guarantees.  But I can say with reasonable certainty that you'll be given SOME time off when you graduate.

[Glowing_Since_09]

I graduate boot camp mid December, I'm guessing i'll be fortunate enough to have leave after boot camp for holiday stand down?

[Already Gone]

The Navy operates 365 days a year.  If your command has a stand-down over the holiday season, it is simply a time when personnel who are not in the duty section either do not have to report or have a shortened work day.  What that means to you is that you may be assigned to a duty section and may or may not have to report to work on the two or three days in between duty days.  It certainly does not mean that they give everybody leave and shut the place down for two weeks.  In fact, taking leave during a stand-down is discouraged.  It is considered a Bravo Foxtrot to take leave then, because the fewer people who are on leave - the more duty sections you can have - the more days off between duty days you get.

Training commands generally do operate in stand-down mode during the Christmas/New Year holiday season.  But, being the new guy, you have no reason to expect that they will grant you leave.  This will be pretty much the case for you for your first two years.

However, you may be authorized leave in transit when you graduate RTC.  Normally, PCS (permanent change of station) orders allow for the member to take leave concurrent with travel to the new duty station.  Leave for persons in transit is subject to authorization from the receiving command.
Recruit leave (for when you graduate RTC) used to be automatic, but then it was prohibited for all but a few special circumstances.  The only reason I can think of for the Navy to authorize you leave between RTC and A School is that they won't want to be bothered to process you in because they are having a little holiday break.  My guess is that you will have to report directly, and then ask for leave when you get there - which is quite possible but not guaranteed.

In short, plan to be spending your holiday season at NFAS doing little or nothing.  Use the down time to learn the ins and outs of the base and the local area.

[DDMurray]

You'll likely have a report date based on Boot Camp grad date.  Depending on the number of hold students available to man the watchbill, you will likely get some window to take leave during the standdown when you get to NNPTC.  WRT operational commands, most boats in my experience encourage leave during standdowns.  Meet minimum watchstanding requirements, and get the most guys possible away from the boat.  This can be challenging depending on manning and ship's schedule following the standdown.  Somebody will likely counsel you on getting too much of a negative leave balance.  You'll make it up fast when you get to a boat, but make sure you have a positive leave balance when your 2 year extension goes into effect.

DM

[Gamecock]

  In fact, taking leave during a stand-down is discouraged.  It is considered a Bravo Foxtrot to take leave then, because the fewer people who are on leave - the more duty sections you can have - the more days off between duty days you get.

Training commands generally do operate in stand-down mode during the Christmas/New Year holiday season.  But, being the new guy, you have no reason to expect that they will grant you leave.  This will be pretty much the case for you for your first two years.

Beercourt, you are wrong more often then you are right when it comes to navy stuff. 

As DDMurray said, taking leave during standdown is encouraged, not discouraged.

And, NNPTC does in fact have a holiday standdown period. 

Cheers,
GC

[Already Gone]

Well, maybe it's just been too long.

I know that some things will never change, though.

Beaurocracy always wins.  People will always look to avoid work and maximize leisure time.

The Yeoman (or whatever the modern Navy calls them now) runs everything, and his or her decision is the one you have to live with as long as he lets the CO and XO believe that they are really in charge.

And, while the command encourages leave during stand-downs, the crew does not.  The more guys on leave - the fewer duty sections.  The sailors (a real bunch of artists at this) know that you don't take leave when you are only working one out of four days - you take leave when the boat is in the shipyard and the crew is working 16 hour days 6 days a week and duty on Sunday.  You need to get the most out of leave days.  The guy who takes leave at Christmas is the guy who forced his shipmates from 4 section to 3, he's the guy who got to go home for Christmas, he's the guy that everyone will MF until they get the chance to pay him back.  The WILL pay him back.  You most assuredly don't want to be the NUB who got Christmas leave when the qualified guys got stuck on duty.  The payback for that is severe for sure.  I don't know if you were an enlisted guy once, but that's how they think.  I'm not saying that it's right, that's just the way it is.  We could start a whole new topic about how the officers and chiefs get it completely wrong every time they think they are doing something to improve crew morale.

Anyway, since you are in the best position to answer, what is the answer?  If a recruit shows up from Great Lakes on Dec. 16th (or thereabouts) are you going to let him go home on leave, or are you going to give him a toilet brush and a bucket?

[Preciousblue1965]

Well back in my day, all short 12 years ago, if you went to boot during the holidays, you stayed at boot during the holidays.  Don't know if you exchanged gifts or anything like that, but i am pretty sure they give you a special meal during that time.  I don't think that you can leave base during holidays(least you go out in town and eat some good food and spoil that meal plan they had you on) and not sure if you can have visitors.  You will not get leave between Boot and A school, you will fly directly to Charleston and there will be a duty driver to pick you up.  If you are in A school during the holidays, they will stand down and all but force you to take leave.  When I went through, we had 2 weeks of christmas leave and came back, graduated A school and got 2 more weeks of leave a mere month later.  You will get two more weeks between Power School and Prototype, some of which will be taken up getting set up in a new apartment(unless you are smart and during your few precious free hours you work on getting everything set up while you are still in school, such as utilities, apartment searching, and figure out what to do about furniture).  You can take leave during Prototype but ONLY if you are fully qualified.  There is NO standdown period during the holidays for Prototype.  Best you can hope for is a couple of days off during your normal shift week, and that is only if you are either qualified or very far ahead of the curve.  After Prototype, you will usually get close to 30 days of leave if you want to take it to get to yoru next duty station, depending on operational requirements of your new ship(such as if they are getting ready to deploy, they might not let you take all 30 days). 

While on the ship, leave is a whole other matter.  Yes you can take leave, but it isn't as easy as in school.  YOu have to find people to cover your duty, can't miss underways, and most of the time you have be supporting the watchbill in some way prior to taking leave.  Holiday standdowns are also different on the ship, which is what BeerCourt is getting at.  They generally let half a department go on leave for a week and then the other half.  Most of the time it is Duty section only work days(means you don't have duty, you don't come to work) but due to half of the people being on leave Duty rotation usually gets cut to half as long as it was.  For example, after my first deployment we were 8 section duty, duty section only.  That is because no one took any leave.  We came to work once a week.  If people took leave, we would have been 4 section Duty and would have had to come to work once very 4 days and burn leave. 

Hope that clears things up for you, or did I just throw in a bucket of dirt???

[DDMurray]

Beaurocracy always wins.  People will always look to avoid work and maximize leisure time.

The Yeoman (or whatever the modern Navy calls them now) runs everything, and his or her decision is the one you have to live with as long as he lets the CO and XO believe that they are really in charge.

And, while the command encourages leave during stand-downs, the crew does not.  The more guys on leave - the fewer duty sections.  The sailors (a real bunch of artists at this) know that you don't take leave when you are only working one out of four days - you take leave when the boat is in the shipyard and the crew is working 16 hour days 6 days a week and duty on Sunday.  You need to get the most out of leave days.  The guy who takes leave at Christmas is the guy who forced his shipmates from 4 section to 3, he's the guy who got to go home for Christmas, he's the guy that everyone will MF until they get the chance to pay him back.  The WILL pay him back.  You most assuredly don't want to be the NUB who got Christmas leave when the qualified guys got stuck on duty.  The payback for that is severe for sure.  I don't know if you were an enlisted guy once, but that's how they think.  I'm not saying that it's right, that's just the way it is.  We could start a whole new topic about how the officers and chiefs get it completely wrong every time they think they are doing something to improve crew morale.

Anyway, since you are in the best position to answer, what is the answer?  If a recruit shows up from Great Lakes on Dec. 16th (or thereabouts) are you going to let him go home on leave, or are you going to give him a toilet brush and a bucket?

BC,
I agree that if you asked the guys whether they'd want to be 3 or 4 section during a standdown, every one of them would say 4.  If you asked some of those same guys to draft a leave and school plan that ensured everyone got their 30 days of vacation they earned that year, they couldn't do it.  I think you're wrong about the YN's.  They can affect your pay, but they really don't affect the command leave policy, other than typing it up.  As a blue shirt, I reported to my first boat with a negative leave balance so I hoarded leave.  When I reported to my next boat as a Chief I had about 20 days on the books.  I left 4 and half years later with an 85 day leave balance and ended up losing some days.  During my next shore tour I used up all the leave so that I reported to my next boat with about 20 days of leave.  My thought was that I always wanted enough leave to take emergency leave without going negative.  When I left my last boat I had around 70 days of leave and sold 30 when I re-enlisted.  When I retired I ended up selling back about 15 more days.  The moral of this story is:
1. Once you get to a boat, you don't know when you'll get to take leave so as a leader I always encouraged my guys to take leave whenever the boat's schedule would support.  Another thing I tried to do is to always get my guys to take a two week period off sometime during the year.  This guidance is in the Mil Pers Manual.
2.  30 days of leave in a year adds up pretty quick, so as long as you don't have negative leave balance when your extension goes into effect, take leave when you get the chance.

It seems to me there is less "MF'ing" going on because more people want to go home for the holidays and most guys realize, it may be harder to take leave later depending on the boat's schedule.  PB1965's post is spot on, though I never saw a sub eng dept go 8 section, even the EDPOs.

I think I answered the lad's question in my previous post - depending on when he reports and the watchbill, he should be able to take leave, if he desires during the Christmas Standdown period.

DDM

[Already Gone]

I think we have proved a couple of things here.

1. No two commands do things exactly alike.

2. Within a single command, things change over time.

3. You can't please everyone.

4. The harder you try to please the blueshirts, the less likely you are to succeed at it.

5. You take leave whenever they let you.

6. Your leave request is just a worthless piece of paper until you get the CDO to sign you out.

7. Nothing we tell you here has any bearing on what will really happen when you report to NNPTC.

[withroaj]

7. Nothing we tell you here has any bearing on what will really happen when you report to NNPTC.

Sure it can.  Check it out:  Your attitude while in the Navy WILL impact your entire experience. 

Two weeks of leave over the holidays is a drop in the bucket (~14 of 2190 days) and it won't make much of a difference whether you get leave or not (in my opinion taking leave immediately after boot camp may slow the process of severing the umbilical cord).

Developing a negative attitude because "the Navy stole Christmas" will impact the rest of your Navy time.  Don't sweat it.  Expect to be overwhelmed for a while at every new command.  Expect a raw deal from time to time.  Appreciate the good deals -- which for some are few and far between -- and try to make a good thing of the six years of your life that you signed away.  If you like it they'll let you stay in for thirty years; if you don't you can transition to the civilian world again.  Piece of cake.

[JustinHEMI05]

What kind of attitude does it take to believe you've signed your life away for 6 years, vice believing you've volunteered to serve and protect this country in the most giving way possible?  

Justin

[JustinHEMI05]

The point is not about which rate/MOS has it worse. I personally don't weigh one service member's value against another's. YMMV.

Justin

[goobs22xx]

When I went through (2002-2003) we had 2 weeks of grad leave after A-school, 2 weeks of leave after power school, and 30 days of leave after prototype.  That was not including Christmas standdown, which was 2 weeks.

No guarantees.  But I can say with reasonable certainty that you'll be given SOME time off when you graduate.

Just to give a more recent timeframe, the above is accurate to when I went through as well (2006-07).

The only guys who didn't get the full grad leave after A-School were the ones who graduated late in the cycle for the next Power School class. (fyi, A school has a class graduate/class up weekly, and Power school classes up every 8. This means that the guys in the 8th A school class for a given Power school class roll right into it....or there may only be 7 A classes for a given Power school class....you get the idea anyway). This is, fwiw, how I remember it.

[KUrunner]

My husband graduated A school in April and was allowed to take 10 days of leave; however, T-Track was running low and his section had to wait until May to take it.  I'm not sure if they still have it, but when I graduated in 2000, we could take an extra week and do recruiting duty where we helped out and our local recruiting station.  I heard that most recruiters were pretty lax and didn't have people check in at all, but my station had me come in and work longer hours than the actual recruiters.  This wasn't offered to my husband a few months ago, but again, that could have been due to staffing issues on T-Track.  So, in theory, you could get about 17 days.

Christmas stand down is not a guaranteed 2 weeks of leave now, although with all the hold sections for NPTU, I would imagine that duty days will be few if you aren't able to leave.

[imthehoopa]

Well, from someone who graduated 3 weeks ago.. Depending on when you graduate with respect to the class up cycle you may take your leave immediately after graduating or if you are the first or second P-school feeder classes it may be a month before they give you your availability until they have enough people to fill the watchbills and cleaning crew. Right now they do not offer the recruiting duty in addition to your leave. You are limited to 10 days and if you do the recruiting duty, it will just save a few of those leave days you've accumulated.

As far as we've been instructed about holiday stand down, you can take leave during one of two availability periods, one for Christmas and one for the New Year. If you choose not to take leave, you only have to muster every 4th day. If you live close enough to make the drive, it might just work best for you not to take leave during that time. For Thanksgiving, the 26-29 are off days. If you are in the group that classes up on the 24th, the first real day of classes will begin on the 30th.

[pandadair]

Right now they do not offer the recruiting duty in addition to your leave. You are limited to 10 days and if you do the recruiting duty, it will just save a few of those leave days you've accumulated.

Does the recruiting duty vary quite a bit from class to class?  My fiance finished A school on June 6, then t-track for about 5 weeks, and 11 days' leave from July 10-21.  But he signed up for recruiting duty and got his leave extended until the 26th.

As far as other leave time... I know he's coming home for a few days at Thanksgiving, though I think that just involves a travel request chit (special request chit?), not any accumulated leave.  And they will have a 2 week Holiday stand down, the week before Christmas and the week after.


Also, since someone brought up boot camp and Christmas (though I believe that poster said they will be done before then)... My fiance left for boot camp last year on December 16, so Christmas came during his 2nd week there.  They had a "light" day on Christmas day, but they still weren't allowed to make phone calls or anything like that. 

[KUrunner]

The current story the staff is giving now, at least for those waiting to class up for NPTU, is that they will have Nov 26-29 off if they aren't taking grad leave.  Christmas is currently planned to be a 4 duty section rotation.