Pre-Employment Training

[whowhenwhy]

I'm after some info please guys. I'm thinking of applying for one of the MSc/PhD courses that get "offered" out to those of us already in the Service and wondered what the deal was in terms of oversight by those paying the bills, accn and stuff. Do you get excess rent, or do you get put up in the nearest set of family quarters going? Cheers all :ok:

[Bladdered]

If the course is at Shrivenham, you occupy FMQs or live in the mess. I elected to travel daily - a bit of a hike, but proved it was cheaper than paying for my family to move - suppose I could have lived in but the SLA was dreadful. Had to negotiate with the desky to be detached and continued to be parented by my Unit - not sure how that works now that SHQ is manned by an SAC and the Unit cat though :rolleyes:.

[MG]

They're just about at the end of a big refurb programme at Shrivenham so the SLA is as good as you'll get anywhere now. I've got no idea about the degrees on offer though!

[whowhenwhy]

It's not at Shrivenham, it's the scheme where you get to go out in the big wide world and mix with real people at university for a year. Young student fillies and all that :E. Maybe I'd best not do it eh?

[Bladdered]

Do it...........:ok: Detachment rules!!

[Beatriz Fontana]

SLA is rather spectacular and a thorough improvement to what was. Food in the mess has got better over the past six months, too.

Yeah, go for it.

[Satellite_Driver]

Health warning: most of my knowledge of this is a few years old but I did some digging a little while back on behalf of a JO who was thinking about this and things seem still to be mostly the same. BUT check with your desky for details.

What you're talking about sounds like the APET (Advanced Pre-Employment Training) scheme which identifies certain posts as requiring MSc-level qualification. The post sponsor identifies a suitable course; candidates are boarded for suitability for both the post and the subsequent job and if selected are sent off to do the course and then posted into the job.

Plus points:
- An MSc paid for by HM Govt, on full pay and with appropriate accommodation package.
- You know your career plan for the next four or five years as you will generally be going into a post with a fixed 3-year duration.
- Quite a lot of posts are established at a particular rank so as long as you are a credible candidate for promotion you will get acting rank for the job provided you pass the APET board.
- Some of the 'starred appointments' with an APET attached are in really nice places (e.g. USA).

Minus points:
- Fewer posts than there were as they are expensive and prone to be disestablished or contractorised.
- It's all too easy to come out the other end and find that you are seen by promotion boards as having spent 4 years out of the mainstream whilst your fellow candidates have done two tours plus a trip somewhere sandy.
- The above is doubly bad if you held acting rank in a post above your current rank. I knew someone who was told that he hadn't made sqn ldr despite three years in acting rank and was going to revert to flt lt in his next tour. Cue instant PVR! However, I hear that this is now less likely as the SOAR scheme (substantiation of acting rank) means that people in such a position are separately boarded to review why they shouldn't be promoted.
- Conversely, there can be reluctance to put you into a post in your current rank if you are anywhere near promotion as the owning organisation hate it when their expensively-trained expert gets picked up and sent somewhere else, leaving them in the lurch. A very few posts are dual-ranked to get around this but many aren't.
- Some starred appointments may get you a nice qualification but require you to spend three years in Abbey Wood managing requirement specifications for spares databases.

Like I said, your desk officer can offer advice, including whether you are a credible candidate and what the impact on your career would be.

Completely separate to all this are the Chief of the Air Staff's Fellowships (see document here (http://www.airpowerstudies.co.uk/casfellowships.htm)) by which you can apply under various schemes to do various levels of academic study from one term to a full PhD.

[whowhenwhy]

Thanks Satellite Driver - yep that's the one I'm looking at. Anyone else with any experience of having done one? :)