Expert: Rod Powers - 10/10/2006

Question
Long story short: My husand was looking into joining the coast guard, all the paper work and test were done. Come the day to ship out, he doen't make weight( He had an awful recruiter, who never told him about that) few weeks later, makes weight, gets another date.When the date nears, we get a call saying the restrictions has changed and in order to be in the coat guard you need a high school diploma or 15 colleg credits...
Airforce- Ok, well now he's intrested in the airforce , and I would like to know if there really strick on that as well. When we spoke to a marines recruiter we were told they made some exceptions as far as that,and would take him with his G.e.d, but Im not a big fa of them...
also, would they be able to help fiance his school if he does need 15 credits? And what are some helpful tips we should no before talking to a recruiter. Hes intrested in the police field, and my main concern is deployment. And we would like to get this started asap...

Answer
Hi Vanessa,

The Air Force takes *very few* GED-holders each year (less than 0.05 percent). In other words, he would have a better chance of getting struck by lightening, than getting into the Air Force with a GED. I'm sorry, but it's just that simple.

With a GED, in order to be considered on the same education level as a high school diploma holder, he must have at least 15 college credits.

And, no. The Air Force won't finance this. Why should they? The Air Force gets more applicants to join every year than they can use, so they have no reason to pay to make people qualified.

For details, you may wish to read my multi-part article, "What the Recruiter Never Told You," at: http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/joiningup/a/recruiter1.htm

Hope this helps!

Rod Powers
http://usmilitary.about.com