Hey everyone. I finally graduated with my bachelors in Information Systems after 9 years. (Single dad here). I’m currently studying for the ASVAB to raise my scores and was originally planning on trying for accelerated OCS (obligatory National Guard mention) next summer.

Like many other, I’ve been wanting to try for the cyber branch. I’ve completed a cybersecurity bootcamp from Jan - May and came out with A+ and Sec+ along with a few more vouchers (working on Cisco CyberOps and CySA+).

I was set on going the officer route, even though it was competitive, until I reached out to a couple officers in this branch through LinkedIn. One of them said he wasn’t discouraging me from becoming an officer, but that I should look into switching over to enlisted first and then trying for warrant.

According to him WO’s have more opportunities for training and usually get their training approved first. He mentioned SANS courses specifically.

What are some things to take into consideration? The way he explained it the WO route sounds pretty good and I get that Officers are usually stuck in politics more often than not. Would the experience in the officer route help out better in the long term in a civilian career? Even though the wait time might be long for the officer route, the WO route would take some time too, wouldn’t it?