The Navy has a simple reason for why it’s offering Navy JROTC members higher pay rates.
“There has been a disparity in rates,” Command Master Chief Steve Spahr, deputy operations officer for the Surface Navy Education and Training Command, told Fox News on Monday.
It’s about money.
It’s not always clear why that disparity exists, but there is a reason: The Navy wants JROTC participants to pay more for college.
“We want everybody to be within our paygrade, and we are pushing to push up our paygrade rates so our JROTC children, at their entry-level salaries, are effectively at our rate of pay,” Spahr said.
“We’re pushing for our kids to pay market rates,” he added.
That’s not to say they get much.
Congress has no such mandate for JROTC to pay market rates for college, but it does say JROTC must pay for their classes.
A study by Sailor Network found that JROTC at the beginning of the 2013-2014 school year paid $450 less per year than those same members at higher-paying military academies. JROTC membership there is 2,150.
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