THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 28, 1994 TAG: 9409270355
SECTION: MILITARY NEWS PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
It's never been easy, and Navy boot camp is about to get harder.
Beginning in January, the service will beef up its formal training curriculum, forcing recruits to complete 570 hours of work in the same eight-week span that now includes only 370 hours. More than one-third of the new hours will be devoted to physical training and conditioning.
``We're trying to ensure we make use of all the time available,'' said Carl Ross, training adviser at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center.
The changes, to take effect Jan. 1, will remove much of the ``free'' time boot camp company commanders have had to work with recruits outside the Navy's formal curriculum. The curriculum spells out what the commanders should be teaching, leaving less to their discretion.
For the 91.5 hours of physical training in the program, for example, commanders will have a specific regimen of exercises to follow. The program was designed with help from a group of physical therapists, so ``we know that (it) builds physical strength,'' Ross said.
Under the existing program, if a particular commander ``was a runner, he took troops out and ran them,'' Ross said. That didn't always produce the kind of total conditioning the service wants.
But while limiting the commanders' freedom, the program will add to their ranks. Each recruit company soon will have three commanders, an increase of one that should provide round-the-clock coverage and guarantee more one-on-one and small group instruction.
The increase has helped soothe whatever disappointment commanders might feel because of the increased structure in the curriculum, Ross said. By adding commanders, the Navy can work more closely with a student who is not performing up to expectations, he added.
In addition to increased physical training, the curriculum will stress ``hands-on'' labs to teach recruits seamanship skills and weapons handling. Recruits will march and drill with rifles for the first time in years and will learn to field strip and clean an M-14, for example.
Ross said the curriculum will follow a ``building block approach,'' with instruction in most areas running throughout the eight weeks in camp. Where the old curriculum might have covered all of naval history in a single week, the new plan stretches that out through boot camp so lessons learned early are reinforced.
``Before, you got history in one swoop - `here's history' - and you never saw it or talked it,'' Ross said.
Along with changing the curriculum, the Navy is consolidating all of its boot camp training at Great Lakes, about 40 miles north of Chicago. The change has allowed the service to cut its training staff from about 1,300 to around 900, Ross said, even while adding a third commander to each recruit company.
Female recruits, who previously were trained in Orlando, Fla., now train alongside men at Great Lakes. The Navy projects that about 15 percent of the 52,000 recruits who will pass through the center in 1995 will be women, Ross said.
The service would like to increase that percentage. With most career paths now open to women, it hopes it can, but Ross stressed that there is no quota. ILLUSTRATION: NAVY PHOTO
A recruit at Great Lakes Naval Training Center gets some instruction
on how to carry a flag. A new curriculum will stress ``hands-on''
labs to teach recruits seamanship and weapons skills.
THE NEW CURRICULUM
Current Projected
Area hours hours
Basic seamanship 38 83
Military adaptation 35 84
Weapons training 3 47.5
Physical training 21 91.5
Military drill 31 40
Curriculum effective Sept. 1, 1995.
by CNB