My Experience as an Officer Cadet

As an officer cadet we travel to Caernarfon every Tuesday nights to do some basic army training such as weapon handling, map readings and some commanding tasks. With some fitness sessions to end the nights.

As a regiment we sacrifice two of our weekends per month to travel to Sennybridge or Nescliff to do futher training by utilising methods we’ve learnt in training nights and applying them out in the field either we do it in the barracks or out in the wild camping.

The whole purpose of this is to give university students a glimps of what it’s like to be an effective officer.

The Regret

Before university I’ve always considered joining in the military as a path but didn’t really took it that seriously. In fact I looked at it as more as a last resort path, so with very little research about the military (which  now regret) I’ve scrapped the idea and headed straight University. Only on my second year of I was aware of the UOTC, thanks a friend of mine from first year, told me everything about it. The fun, opportunities and the experiences. On my 3rd year, I came to look for the UOTC’s stand in serendipity and my name was first on the list.

Why I love it

I really enjoy the lifestyle in the UOTC What we do in training no civilian could ever do. We fire rifles, blow things up, camp in extreme conditions and even play call of duty but this time in real life (with blank bullets obviously). Also did I forget to mention the great fitness we benefit form it? It’s intense.

There are extra perks in all of this, I’ve made new friends either from Bangor, Swansea and Cardiff Universities! There’s a great opportunity to travel to do some extreme sports and gain qualifications from it!

This December we traveled to the french Alps to do some skiing. Never skiied before they’ve taught me so much that now I have a qualification form it! And the best part… I got paid doing it!

Reflection, definitely considering going through this path.

Now on my third year I’ve realised that I’ve missed out on these opportunities as I could have started this adventure during my first year where I had less university work and no sports club commitments as I really do enjoy my time being in the army environment specially when I get trained to be an officer as I seem to enjoy and doing a good job managing and commanding as captain in powerlifting. If I have started on my first year I could have reached to a higher rank on my third year giving me great advantage to become an officer after university. In fact I have sent off my application and I am scheduled a briefing weekend on June.