Commissions In Legal or Medical Fields

[Cougar90]

How do you go about getting a direct commission in the legal or medical fields in openings other than attorney, nurse, or doctor? Which jobs are listed? Any information you have would be very helpful.

[SGT Peter Bridge]

How do you go about getting a direct commission in the legal or medical fields in openings other than attorney, nurse, or doctor? Which jobs are listed? Any information you have would be very helpful.
sorry but you don't

hate to be so short but that is what the direct commissions are for.

[matthew.ritchie]

How do you go about getting a direct commission in the legal or medical fields in openings other than attorney, nurse, or doctor? Which jobs are listed? Any information you have would be very helpful.

Am I missing something? You're asking how you can get a commission in the medical field without being a medical professional? This makes no sense to me. If I'm off-base, please clarify, because on its face your question appears absurd.

[Cougar90]

Medical as in tech fields, ect. Legal fields as in paralegal, ect. How is that no sense or absurd?

[Javier Lopez]

Paralegals and medical "techs" are solely enlisted personnel and the only other possibility in the Legal Field, is as a Warrant Officer (Legal Administrator) NO DIRECT APPOINTMENT, for such position.

[BoopMD]

Take with a grain a of salt anything Mathew.Ritchie says about the special branches. Forgive him, he just does not know and feels compelled to respond anyway.

It is not an absurd question.
Medical Corps, Nurse Corps, Medical Specialist Corps, Vetrinary Corps, Medical Service Corps have direct commission routes. As do JAG and Chaplain Corps.

Physician Assistants, Physical therapists, pharmacists, optomotrists, chiropractors, nuclear medicine, industrial hygiene, entomologists, social workers, audiologists, medical technologists, medevac aviators, psychologists, podiatrists, vetrinarians, are direct commissioned, in the reserve/guard and they are not enlisted.

There is A LOT of misinformation on this site about the special branches. If you are interested contact the medical accessions NG recruiter in the state of interest. Run far, very far from the regular recruiter. They have no idea what you are even talking about. They however, probably know how to get you in touch with the medical recruiter but other then that phone number, don't listen to a word they have to say on the Special Branches of the Army and direct commissions.

[andrew.tischner]

Take with a grain a of salt anything Mathew.Ritchie says about the special branches. Forgive him, he just does not know and feels compelled to respond anyway.

It is not an absurd question.
Medical Corps, Nurse Corps, Medical Specialist Corps, Vetrinary Corps, Medical Service Corps have direct commission routes. As do JAG and Chaplain Corps.

Physician Assistants, Physical therapists, pharmacists, optomotrists, chiropractors, nuclear medicine, industrial hygiene, entomologists, social workers, audiologists, medical technologists, medevac aviators, psychologists, podiatrists, vetrinarians, are direct commissioned, in the reserve/guard and they are not enlisted.

There is A LOT of misinformation on this site about the special branches. If you are interested contact the medical accessions NG recruiter in the state of interest. Run far, very far from the regular recruiter. They have no idea what you are even talking about. They however, probably know how to get you in touch with the medical recruiter but other then that phone number, don't listen to a word they have to say on the Special Branches of the Army and direct commissions.


Boop you really should watch where you throw stones. The original poster was asking a question in a way to make it seem she has no education in any field. Thus making a direct commission not a option. Which what Major Ritchie was trying to ask and the OP never responded.

You do not need to bash one poster to post information you know.

[matthew.ritchie]

Take with a grain a of salt anything Mathew.Ritchie says about the special branches. Forgive him, he just does not know and feels compelled to respond anyway.
...

I'm glad you're here to correct me. I'll expect you to answer all the AMEDD-related questions now. I'll lay off AMEDD, and stick to basic branch.

Please provide me your email address, because people email me AMEDD questions directly, and I'll forward those questions to you as well.

[Cougar90]

I am the original poster. Male with a college degree, a paralegal certificate, and 14 years in the National Guard. Javier Lopez was the poster who made the most sense. The second was from MD who told me to get the information from the JAG or MD office in my state. I don't have a clue about the other two guys who appeared to be in a turf war over posting. I am looking for solid information, not guesses or opinions about other posters.

[andrew.tischner]

Cougar you have to tell us what information your looking for. You are asking for direct commisioning information but in a way its so broad we have no idea what your looking for.

If your looking for a paralegal direct commision there is none. That is a enlisted job. Seems to me that with your limited information OCS or enlisted is the way you would have to go for now.

[Javier Lopez]

Cougar90: To recap. It is my recommendation you get with the specified branch of service you want to get directly commissioned to and get the facts straight from the horse's mouth. I can say about the JAGC, only Lawyers admitted to the Bar of any State, Puerto Rico, DC and Territories are permitted to get directly appointed JAG officers. It is a requirement for this (special and limited) branch to be admitted to practice law, even before you get shipped to JAGOBC. As for medical branches, in my time in service I haven't had any information of specifics as to what specialty are to be directly commissioned in the Army (i.e. reserves, NG, active), other than being part of the Medical Branch as a whole. (Except Vets) Whatever specialty you have, can be directly appointed to the Medical Branch. You just have to have the requirements of your specialty under NGRs to be directly Commissioned.

On the other hand, being so you have a college degree, this can surely qualify you for OCS, where no branch is guaranteed. I do not know how the WO program works to that effect, but surely you must come from the ranks and from the 27 field as for JAGs. Hope this helps.

[BoopMD]

Judge Advocate General’s Corps
Direct commissions are available to individuals who have graduated from an American Bar
Association accredited law school with a J.D. or L.L.B. degree and are members in good standing
of the bar of a Federal court or the highest court of any state or the District of Columbia.
Individuals may apply during first semester of the final year of law school.

ROTC cadets who apply for educational delay to attend law school are eligible to be selected to
serve in the JAG Corps must apply in November or March if not selected by the November board.
Applicants are commissioned as first lieutenant and promoted to captain at six to nine
months of service. Initial three-and-a-half month program begins at Fort Lee, Va., (three weeks)
and concludes (10 weeks) at the JAG school in Charlottesville, Va. The training continues with
four weeks of the Direct Commissioned Officer Course (DCO) and ends with six weeks of officer
leadership and Soldier skills training at Basic Officer Leadership Course (BOLC).

Graduate programs for senior captains and junior majors offer L.L.M. accredited by the American Bar
Association. The 10-month program is at the JAG school in Charlottesville, Va.
Over 40 continuing legal education (CLE) courses are offered annually, which meet most
state CLE requirements. The summer intern program offers real and immediate legal
experience in legal positions for 100 law students.

For more information, visit www.jagcnet.army.
mil, call 1 (866) ARMY-JAG or write:
Department of the Army
Judge Advocate Recruiting Office Suite 5200
Office of the Judge Advocate General
1777 N. Kent St.
Rosslyn, VA 22209-2194

[Wild1]

If you have any degree in one of the health, life, or physical sciences. Or engineering and posibly Math you can be direct comissioned into the AMEDD branch. However, the job may vary according to the level of your degrees. For instance, some AOC's need a masters degree or higher. Some require a Doctoral or professional degree. but you can become a medical sciences officer or XO in a medical unit with a BS in Biology or Health Administration. Those are both direct commissioned jobs.

To put it bluntly any health, life, physical, medical, or engineering sciences degree -- in addition to some Mathmatical (ie. biostatistics) can get you direct commissioned at the rank of anywhere from 2Lt to Major depending on experience.

[Wild1]

If you have any degree in one of the health, life, or physical sciences. Or engineering and posibly Math you can be direct comissioned into the AMEDD branch. However, the job may vary according to the level of your degrees. For instance, some AOC's need a masters degree or higher. Some require a Doctoral or professional degree. but you can become a medical sciences officer or XO in a medical unit with a BS in Biology or Health Administration. Those are both direct commissioned jobs.

To put it bluntly any health, life, physical, medical, or engineering sciences degree -- in addition to some Mathmatical (ie. biostatistics) can get you direct commissioned at the rank of anywhere from 2Lt to Major depending on experience.

another thing is to Branch AMEDD through any of the commissioning programs...I think you can become an AMEDD officer with any degree....but thats a totally different monkey from direct commissioning.

[BoopMD]

There is a new direct commission program that just came out for Medical & dental students who will be or are already enrolled in professional schools and for Physician assistants who will be enrolled in a masters degree granting program.

It is ADSW. There are 200 slots as of May 2008 nationwide that can be filled.

On this program, a professional school student / candidate will be considered active duty with all pay and allowances (especially important if one has dependants.) While attending fulltime in their professional school up to 4 years for med/dents and 2 years for PAs. This is such a new program that even some of the Army National Guard medical recruiters are still fuzzy about the details.

I was informed that participants are strictly National Guard and that there is never any active duty obligation.

1:1 payback. For every year of this financial aid program 1 year of service obligation.

While this ADSW program in the national guard will not pay specifically for tuition. Tuition assistance is available $4500/fiscal year. In addition, some state's legislative bodies, such as in Illinois, will pay for 4 years free tuition to a state school.

Combine that with this program and one would come out of professional school with absolutely zero debt, promotion and creditable time toward retirement.

This financial assistance program does not preclude one from participating in other health profession incentives and bonuses that are also available in the National Guard once the participant is medically credentialed. (However, those bonuses and financial incentives also have payback time in the national guard.)

in my opinion, this is the best deal (better than the active duty obligating Health Professions Scholarship Program - HPSP) and is meant to address the critical shortages in the Army National Guard. The last numbers I had seen were that physicians were at 39% strength in the ARNG.

I do have an ulterior motive to post here. The more physicians and physician assistants that we have in the Army National Guard across the country means the more everyone can help and do their part in supporting the troops vs having the same physicians deployed over and over again.

Deployments in austere environments to help save the lives of our soldiers as part of the Army Medical team is not for everyone, so please do not consider joining under this program unless one really feels the need to serve outside of the financial assistance.

I am not sure, but nurse anethetists may also be covered in this program. In order to gain more information about this ADSW program contact the medical recruiter for the Army National Guard in your state. If that individual does not know about this - have that medical recruiter contact other Army National Guard medical recruiters (they all talk to each other at conferences) so that they can find out. The Illinois ARNG Medical recruiter is familiar with this program, so they can get information on where to start from her or they'll get in contact with someone who knows at the National Guard Bureau.

Rumor is that this program may be availble next year with more slots.
Tell them you read about it here at the forum from BoopMD. They are also discussing this on the student doctor network.