This site is for mothers of kids in the U.S. Navy and for Moms who have questions about Navy life for their kids.

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FOLLOW THESE STEPS TO GET STARTED:

Choose your Username.  For the privacy and safety of you and/or your sailor, NO LAST NAMES ARE ALLOWED, even if your last name differs from that of your sailor (please make sure your URL address does not include your last name either).  Also, please do not include your email address in your user name. Go to "Settings" above to set your Username.  While there, complete your Profile so you can post and share photos and videos of your Sailor and share stories with other moms!

Make sure to read our Community Guidelines and this Navy Operations Security (OPSEC) checklist - loose lips sink ships!

Join groups!  Browse for groups for your PIR date, your sailor's occupational specialty, "A" school, assigned ship, homeport city, your own city or state, and a myriad of other interests. Jump in and introduce yourself!  Start making friends that can last a lifetime.

Link to Navy Speak - Navy Terms & Acronyms: Navy Speak

All Hands Magazine's full length documentary "Making a Sailor": This video follows four recruits through Boot Camp in the spring of 2018 who were assigned to DIV 229, an integrated division, which had PIR on 05/25/2018. 

Boot Camp: Making a Sailor (Full Length Documentary - 2018)

Boot Camp: Behind the Scenes at RTC

...and visit Navy.com - America's Navy and Navy.mil also Navy Live - The Official Blog of the Navy to learn more.

OPSEC - Navy Operations Security

Always keep Navy Operations Security in mind.  In the Navy, it's essential to remember that "loose lips sink ships."  OPSEC is everyone's responsibility. 

DON'T post critical information including future destinations or ports of call; future operations, exercises or missions; deployment or homecoming dates.  

DO be smart, use your head, always think OPSEC when using texts, email, phone, and social media, and watch this video: "Importance of Navy OPSEC."

Follow this link for OPSEC Guidelines:

OPSEC GUIDELINES

Events

**UPDATE 4/26/2022** Effective with the May 6, 2022 PIR 4 guests will be allowed.  Still must be fully vaccinated to attend.

**UPDATE as of 11/10/2022 PIR vaccination is no longer required.

**UPDATE 7/29/2021** You now must be fully vaccinated in order to attend PIR:

In light of observed changes and impact of the Coronavirus Delta Variant and out of an abundance of caution for our recruits, Sailors, staff, and guests, Recruit Training Command is restricting Pass-in-Review (recruit graduation) to ONLY fully immunized guests (14-days post final COVID vaccination dose).  

FOLLOW THIS LINK FOR UP TO DATE INFO:

RTC Graduation

**UPDATE 8/25/2022 - MASK MANDATE IS LIFTED.  Vaccinations still required.

**UPDATE 11/10/22 PIR - Vaccinations no longer required.

RESUMING LIVE PIR - 8/13/2021

Please note! Changes to this guide happened in October 2017. Tickets are now issued for all guests, and all guests must have a ticket to enter base. A separate parking pass is no longer needed to drive on to base for parking.

Please see changes to attending PIR in the PAGES column. The PAGES are located under the member icons on the right side.

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Navy Speak

Click here to learn common Navy terms and acronyms!  (Hint:  When you can speak an entire sentence using only acronyms and one verb, you're truly a Navy mom.)

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Navy.com Para Familias

Visite esta página para explorar en su idioma las oportunidades de educación y carreras para sus hijos en el Navy. Navy.com

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Great Lakes A School Q&A

Information

Great Lakes A School Q&A

The purpose of this group is to allow family of new sailors assigned to school at Training Support Center Great Lakes a chance to voice questions to a Student Division Commander

Location: Great Lakes, IL
Members: 2332
Latest Activity: Mar 12

Discussion Forum

What happens after ASchool?

Started by SailorMom18. Last reply by Phoenixmom Feb 13, 2019. 1 Reply

BECC Info?

Started by adubz33. Last reply by SuBHuni34 Nov 29, 2018. 9 Replies

Comment Wall

Comment

You need to be a member of Great Lakes A School Q&A to add comments!

Comment by Allison on December 12, 2017 at 12:01pm

Phoenixmom yes, and there's even a way for you to know too. Ask him how many duty sections he has, then take his last duty day and repeat it every number of days according to the number of duty sections (usually 4). I did this in my phone, so I didn't have to keep counting, I just set an event as recurring every 4 days on my calendar. It will change if he moves or the ship loses a bunch of sailors to a graduation and not a lot have come in to replace them, but they try to always have 4 duty sections if they can manage. If they duty swap, it will only change that one day because they're swapping the day, not the section. So if they swap Saturday to get it off, they'll have to cover the day of whoever they switched with, let's say it was Friday, but they'll still have duty again on Wednesday, not Tuesday, because the whole section is rotating every four days, not him individually. 

For leave, he should be fine because it's an excused absence, so he's already taken off the rotation and they don't expect him to be there. The only hold up would be if he had duty the day before, so he couldn't leave until after turnover, which most students are advised not to leave until afternoon anyway, so it should be fine since turnover is usually at like 6 I think for day students and 12 for night students. 

I think Anti M has a blog on liberty, maybe she can drop some links later. 

Comment by Donnac on December 12, 2017 at 12:01pm

Thank you ladies!!  This was his first time putting in a chit for overnight liberty.  I think he knew he had duty, but thought the approved liberty took care of it and didn't know he had to switch with someone.  Lessons learned!!!  Have a good day!!

Comment by Anti M on December 12, 2017 at 11:49am

Usually leave at A school is going to be solid.  Allison is right, special liberty doesn't get you out of duty and obligations, it is up to the sailor to get the straight before putting in a chit.  Newer sailors might not have a grasp on the details just yet. Leave, on the other hand, cancels out duty days, so no finding swaps needed.

Also, liberty and special liberty can be cancelled at the discretion of the chain of command.  One underage drinker gets busted?  They can decide to cancel everyone's liberty for the weekend.  I have experienced this, it sucks, and the guilty party feels more than a little peer pressure.  

Leave can be cancelled, or someone recalled back from leave early, but that shouldn't happen in A school.  That's ore for when a ship MUST deploy, or a particular sailor is the only one available who can handle a particular job.  If they're likely to be recalled, they know it in most cases.

Comment by Phoenixmom on December 12, 2017 at 11:31am

ok Thank You, I better check with my Son and make sure he is legit. Thank you for this information it is good for all us Mothers to know.

Comment by Allison on December 12, 2017 at 11:24am

To expand on this, duty happens on a rotation depending how many sections there are per ship, usually 4, so every 4 days he will have duty…with very rare exceptions. If he moved ships recently, he might not have known his rotation yet, so he might have found out only right before you got there. Or maybe he knows his rotation and just couldn't find anyone willing to take Saturday duty (it's a hard one because you basically lose the whole weekend). Those are probably the two most likely reasons it happened. No matter what happened on his end though, it's not really his chief or nmti's concern, they probably even thought it was weird while they were approving it that he wanted liberty on a weekend with Saturday duty, but it's the sailor's responsibility to work that part out and/or plan ahead, so they'll just sign away. A sailor will never be automatically exempt from duty just because they have special liberty because liberty is just like free time, and you can only have that free time when you don't have work to do. Leave is like vacation, and that's when they'd get out of duty and class and all that without being in trouble. 

Comment by Phoenixmom on December 12, 2017 at 11:14am

Thank You Allison, now would they know that ahead of time so they could swap if need be?

Comment by Allison on December 12, 2017 at 11:10am

You still have to duty swap with someone from another section. Special liberty does not exempt you from duty, that's not part of it. The special liberty just means he could leave with you instead of a buddy. I'm sorry…maybe he couldn't find anyone to swap with :(

Comment by Phoenixmom on December 12, 2017 at 10:54am

Donnac I am so sorry to hear that, Anti M can you explain this, because knowing they were approved and chit had dates for the leave why would they do that? Is it the Norm for that to happen doesn't quite make sense.

Comment by Donnac on December 12, 2017 at 10:39am

I hope someone can explain this for me.  Son #1 is in A school in Great Lakes.  Son #2 was supposed to leave for boot camp in March, but got pushed up and is leaving in two days and will miss seeing his brother when he comes home for Christmas.  We live in MN so we decided last weekend to drive to GL so the four of us could spend the weekend together before son #2 leaves.  Son #1 is in phase 3 liberty and got weekend liberty approved.  When we got there he said he had bad news and that he had duty from noon Saturday to noon Sunday.  He was able to be with us Friday night, but had to be back before noon on Saturday.  While we were so thankful for the time we got to spend together, I don't understand why they would approve his liberty and then he would have duty. 

Comment by Phoenixmom on December 12, 2017 at 10:38am

Good Morning Ladies. hope all is well. well I finally got my Sons room done, looks sharp hope he likes.

Cooking my meat and getting the chili ready for more tamales this weekend, got my Christmas shopping done so I'm done. a little late in the game and didn't spend as much but for me Christmas is being with family and Having good food and spirits.

Wishing all you Wonderful Amazing Ladies a Happy Holidays with your Loved one if he/she can be with you and to your Family. May the Lord Bless you all with nothing but Good things this New Year. Amen!

 

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