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Comment by JumpCrisscross | Hacker News Reader

What are the pre-requisite knowledge requirements?

Most nukes I knew were college dropouts with a math/science orientation. The only requirements in the early 80's when I qualified were high scores on Navy science and math aptitude tests. I dropped out of U.C.Berkeley after a year and a half of physics/math - couldn't pass English.

Nukes have been and probably will always be the best underachievers you have ever known.

Killed a scholarship, check. Didn't get the scholarship check.

They tend to be smart and marginally good. The thing is though going through that program tends to right ships and get them in the right place. I have seen this with so many of my friends and with my self. We get back on the right track and get everything else in order. I am now at a 6 figure income and support most of my family. I would never be there without the support of such a program. I can say I pissed away my upbringing, but in reality I learned to be the man I am with that help.

Usually something above 90 on the ASVAB, with exceptions for people who score 80s but take a special math and physics test.

ASVAB grading isn't a fixed scoring system. If you score s 90 it means you beat 90% of the people who took the test. Which means that 99 is the max score. The question pool is also massive usually starting at Jr High difficulty questions ramping up to college and down to kindergarten depending on which questions you get right. Testing Math/science/reading for your primary grade with secondary grades for things like mechanics, table reading, and similar which can be used to qualify you for some other jobs or similar.

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Nukes are great for employers that know to target them when they get out. The whole program could be considered a trial by fire. Training starts with 3-4 years of college shoved into a year and a half. Actual work is a constant fight between being undermanned, leadership, continuous training/testing, responsibilities above their rank and red tape.

Got out after 6 years as a nuke.

ASVAB is for enlisted - you don't take that if you are going officer (NUPOC) for NUPOC you need like a 3-3.5 in some kind of stem thing and maybe other stuff like recommendations ... and you need to pass an interview too I believe with an admiral.

>>responsibilities above their rank

Yep do a task once, superiors start presenting you as the expert. I always hated that.

High ASVAB scores really is about it, and even that is waivable. After they go through boot camp, they will generally get filtered out through attrition at their respective A-School (training school), which is why the requirements can be waived, and they go to a new job.

Very much unlike college admissions (where it's relatively hard to get in, and also hard to flunk out of), it is relatively easy to get into and and also easy to flunk out of the enlisted nuclear program. In my class, the failure rate was about 60% overall, and I think that's pretty typical. They start the failure process pretty early, too, starting with the first round of exams. The Navy is happy to find you another job that isn't quite as demanding. Most of the non-nuclear submariners I worked with were "failed" nukes. In college, it seems like folks are more likely to fail out completely then they are to fail into a less demanding degree that they could still succeed in.

got all 99s on ASVAB and had some interesting interviews with the nuke people when I was younger

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