Class Start Date 15 Jan 19
There is some bad information going around from both official and unofficial channels about the start date for Total Force Officer Training (TFOT) Class 19-04. In accordance with the Holm Center FY19 Class Date schedule memorandum dated 21 May 18, the start date for TFOT 19-04 is 15 Jan 19. This has not changed. All students need to arrive at OTS no later 15 Jan 19. System generated emails or conflicting information stating 16 Jan 19 are incorrect.
Background
The confusion is due to some other changes which aren’t reflected on that memorandum. Class 19-04 will be the first class 19-03 will be the first class attended by both line and non-line officers. In the past, non-line officers attended a course called “Commissioned Officer Training” while line officers attended a course called “Total Force Officer Training.” It sounds like going forward all officer trainees will attend the complete eight week TFOT course together. It is still unclear if there will be a course name change but I personally think the name TFOT remains appropriate.
The source of the bad information is due to some background OTS administrative functions which are normally invisible to the prospective student. In the past there were different classes for guard, reserve, line, and non-line officers. Over the past several years there has been an effort to consolidate this training, hence the name “Total Force Officer Training.” Long story short, merging the processes from completely different worlds can be messy. It will take a while to work out all of the issues.
Summary
The practical take-away from this is that there may be a lot of system generated emails and conflicting information out there, but the arrival date of 15 Jan 19 is the correct date. All students need to arrive at OTS no later 15 Jan 19. I have high confidence that this is accurate because OTS leadership has contacted me and asked me to push this out to you all.
18 Dec 18 Update
This was posted in one of the TFOT Class 19-04 Facebook Groups. This is confirmation of the information I posted in this blog post from the OTS squadron commander. I blocked out his last name and the workflow for privacy reasons but hit me up via email or Facebook message if you need the email.
Changes to the below memorandum will be posted on my FY2019 TFOT Schedule post.
Change Log
- 25 Dec 18 – Adjusted verbiage to include the combined TFOT/COT for class 19-03. The source was a 24 TRS source so from their perspective class 19-04 is the first joint class.
Mike
I’m currently serving in ANG and have been approved to go to TFOT, so I’m just waiting for them to put me into a class, hopefully it would be this coming January. Any news if there are still slots open for January so I may have a chance to attend? Thank you for your time.
airforceotsguy
I wouldn’t know officially that is all through training manager and registrar channels. Informally I seriously doubt there are slots left for January. I would guess they would try to put you in one of the next set of classes. If your training manager stays engaged they may be able to get you in though
Ashlyn Hendrickson
So if the schedule for this 2019 classes says “dining in” on the Tuesday of their graduation week does that mean they aren’t having the normal military ball/dining out where they are in mess dress and bring a guest?
airforceotsguy
You will have to check with current leadership/recent grads on this one. When I was there we had a “dining out” and our spouses could attend. Later they changed it to Dining In because 260 cadets plus spouses is a ton of people so it was too much to handle. The most recent I heard is that it was only a Dining In. For the dining in they likely still do mess dress and the formal dinner just no guest.