For those that don’t know, I am a college student, looking to enlist 18x, with the gold of becoming an 18B, after I graduate.
Early in my life I was diagnosed with a LD in Reading Language Arts. This can mean many things but in my case it means that I have a very hard time spelling, I spell very phonetically. (which is great for Spanish)
The public school system was and is useless for me. They had a lot more kids with a lot worse problems than mine to deal with. On top of that I also tested gifted, manly for my problem solving abilities, so they had no idea what to do with me. So my school weeks as a kid involved 4-6 hours a week in a LD resource room (where all the retarded kids go, for all those who don’t know what this is, and I use the term ‘retarded kids’ because that was what other cruel kids called it and most likely what those who aren’t in the know will remember it as), and then once a week I wasn’t in my home school (meaning my normal elementary or middle school) because I was across town at the gifted school.
I learned to over come my disability. I am a 3.0 student (in college) most semesters, I hold three jobs, and work hard. I am resourceful, in that I use my environment to help over come my difficulty spelling. I have never thought that I shouldn’t be required to take the same test as other students or have more time on papers, although sometime in elementary school they thought I couldn’t think for myself and made me take test in different environments and so on.
I have been studying Spanish for 4 years now, having never made less than a C in a class. I have retaken classes by my choice because I know I need more instruction, not because I didn’t pass them. I have a comprehensive major in college and it dose not require a language minor but I am getting one anyway all this work isn’t because I have to jump through the hoops. A mater of fact, it is the primary reason that I have a 3.0 GPA and not higher.
I have posted this long history to show that I am very capable of learning languages, it just takes more work for me. I will be continuing my Spanish studies for the next two years. The reason I am on the 5-year college plan and not the 4-year plan is because I will do a double study abroad. One summer in Costa Rica and one fall semester in Spain.
I am worried that a low score on the Defense Language Aptitude Battery (DLAB) might slow or prevent me contracting 18x. Correct me if I am wrong but the DLAB is a language aptitude test that uses a made up language that doesn’t really exist to test your ability to learn a language. Therefore the fact that I don’t learn languages fast could hurt me. Right?
Is there a way to over-ride this low score with a letter or test in Spanish that shows my language level in that language (which by then I hope to be near fluent), could I use the Army Civilian Acquired Skills Program (ACASP) or some other program to pre test out of this. How should I approach a recruiter with this info?
My end goal is 7th group anyway, so I would have their primary language, and could then, with the same hard work learn other languages in the Defense Language Institute (DLI) or my group language lab. Is this correct???
I have more questions, and I am sure that this will rise more as replies come in, but this post should get the ball rolling.
Note to QPs: I have searched this topic as best as I can, on both your forum and Google. If I am re-hashing anything let me know, I will read up on the subject and repost with more appropriate questions.
Thank-you for your time,
JPH
Edit: i have found this page (
http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/joini...htm?terms=DLAB) after receiving a PM on this post. so this clears a few things up, but not all, and also adds the question is this right? I hope my use of words in this will help other search this topic!!!
Languages are hard for me… but I am working on it…
Linear Mode
