after a school

[navygirl22]

my boyfriend graduates this friday but when will he find out where he will be stationed and how common is it for them to be stationed outside of the US?

[EmilyNicole98]

Also curious about this, my boyfriend graduates in three weeks but he's under the impression he'll have his orders next week..

[sailorwifenmom]

Depending on his rate, it can be pretty common. We have had 7 perm. duty stations (not counting school commands and such) and 3 of them have been considered overseas. 1 of them was classified as overseas, because we were on an island in the middle of the Bering Sea (that base J's closed now, btw...) and 2 of them were truly overseas. (In fact, we just moved back to the States from Japan.)

Other rates you aren't as likely to be stationed overseas, but you can have a lot of sea duty / spend a lot of time stationed in one geographic area while you just basically transfer from one ship to another.

If you all are thinking of getting married or anything like that, then in my opinion he would be better off requesting sea duty (going to a ship out of a US port) than overseas, because unless he's an E-4 the Navy will NOT authorize him to bring his family overseas with him, and you REALLY do NOT want to move overseas without command sponsorship, for a whole slew of financial, practical application, and immigration / VISA reasons.

[sailorwifenmom]

Also, is he graduating from boot camp or from A school or C school? If he's graduating this week, he should know something by now - whether it's he's going to such and such a or c school (and they will tell him farther into that where his first duty station is), or if he's done with school he should know where he's going, or, at thus point in the fiscal year, he could have even been told that he's going to be on hold at his school command for awhile (the Navy's fiscal year is in Oct, so at this point, their budget is usually pretty tight and they might wait to move him).

But, whatever it is they're doing, if he's done this week he should know what to be expecting for next week by now.

[abuon18]

A lot of rates at the moment are having delays from graduating A school to getting permanent duty station orders. His instructor should have an idea of how long it will be until he gets his orders.

[navygirl22]

He is graduating boot camp. I just really hope it's somewhere in the US, but thank you for the info.

[sailorwifenmom]

He still has A school and possibly a C school next. Depending on what rate he picked that could take anywhere from a couple of months to a year. Once it gets closer to his graduation from that, they'll start filling out dream sheets (saying what sort of duty or location they want). Dream sheets aren't a sure thing, if the Navy has an open billet that your Sailor fits at one of those places, then odds are good he's going to get it, but if they need him somewhere else, then those needs come first.

Now, in a lot if ways, this is the most "up in the air" time. Usually (but nit always - there's always cases where something came up...) - but usually, after you're done with your first duty station, you know 6 - 9 months out where the next duty station's going to be, so plenty of time to prepare :-)

[Angie]

He will be stationed where the Navy needs him, the needs of the Navy changes all the time. 

So he could go anywhere.  They will fill out a dream sheet stating where he wants to go, but that is just a dream and doesn't mean anything when it comes to him getting orders.