MOS, JAGC, Enlisted?

[KayLaw11]

Hello everyone.
I am a newbie, so please forgive any mistakes. I recently decided to try for the Army National Guard. I am an Army brat and a law school graduate looking for career opportunites; I couldn't find anything civilian to my liking so I decided to serve my country like my dad as well as give myself some stability and security.

I have a few questions before I sign on the dotted line:
1) If I go Enlisted (to pay for college loans), what MOS should I choose? Otherwise, I got the impression from my Recruiter that they'll choose for me.

2) How do I go from Enlisted to OCS?

3) Will they help/pay for taking the Bar Exam.

Thank you in advance for all your advice.

[ParalegalNCO1]

Hello everyone.
I am a newbie, so please forgive any mistakes. I recently decided to try for the Army National Guard. I am an Army brat and a law school graduate looking for career opportunites; I couldn't find anything civilian to my liking so I decided to serve my country like my dad as well as give myself some stability and security.

I have a few questions before I sign on the dotted line:
1) If I go Enlisted (to pay for college loans), what MOS should I choose? Otherwise, I got the impression from my Recruiter that they'll choose for me.

2) How do I go from Enlisted to OCS?

3) Will they help/pay for taking the Bar Exam.

Thank you in advance for all your advice.

1) What type of work do you want to do? Do you want to work in the legal field or do something new?

2) You just apply through your chain of command once in your unit, however that is for regular officers. If you have a law degree and wanted to be a JAG officer that is a direct commision and you would not need to attend OCS.

3) Once eligble, you should qualify for reimburment through the GI Bill. If you want to know for sure call them and ask at 888 gibill1

[SabreKhan]

1) 27D (Paralegal) is the only enlisted MOS in the JAG Corps. And honestly, it's not a bad idea financially to either enlist for the bonuses or go active duty for the SLRP money and bonuses. If you want to blow stuff up, choose something else. I know a lawyer who is a navigator in the Air Guard, another one who's a Marine Reserve infantryman. They just wanted to do something other than law on the weekends. Another possible benefit of going in as a 27D is retirement. O6 slots are hard to come by in the Guard, so if you do a few years as an enlisted soldier, then a few more as an officer, and then a few more as a warrant, it will be much easier to make 20 years. And you definitely want to do those enlisted years first rather than when you're in your 40s. Basic training as a 40 year old would be awful. That being said, I didn't want to go to basic and I didn't want to get some junior officer's coffee, so I went in as a Trial Counsel. The benefits of being an O2 are those that generally come with being an officer: respect, responsibility, and experience in the MOS.

2) You'd have several options to go from E to O. You could become a Warrant Officer by going to WOCS. You could become an officer in a branch other than JAG by going to OCS. Since you're already a law school graduate, you'd be a direct commissionee and wouldn't need to go to OCS to become a Judge Advocate. You'd go straight to training. You'd be a direct commissionee whether you went enlisted first or not.

3) I'm not sure the GI Bill will cover the bar exam. SSG ParalegalNCO1 may know something I don't. I have heard of people using the GI Bill to cover bar prep classes, but there are some hurdles to getting Uncle Sam to pay for those, too. The exam itself is usually on your own dime, as far as I know.

[Squash]

1) If I go Enlisted (to pay for college loans), what MOS should I choose?

Eleven Bravo