OnToMars
Now on to the making of films!
Member # 621
posted
Service acadamies do admit based on population, even more than say Brown or Princeton. In order to be admitted to one of the United States' service acadamies (excluding the Coast Guard), you need to secure a nomination from a Congressman, Senator, Vice President, or President. V-P and Pres are reserved for sons and daughters of people who were in the service. So the rest of the applicant pool seek Congressional and Senatorial nominations. These officials can only give out so many nominations based on the population of their district. This is part of the actual admissions process, unlike an unwritten rule as such with schools like Brown or Princeton.
And why would Wesley admit under the jurisdiction of Relva VII? He lives aboard a Federation starship. I would imagine that instead of subjecting ship/facility applicants to backwater towns, they would have a separate division for them, just as the acadamies allow for a quota (for lack of a better term) of enlisted personnel to enter.
Then again, if Starfleet works like the Armed Forces, then Wesley could practically walk into the Academy. His mother is an officer and his father was killed in the line of duty.
And the Acadmies are smaller than most other schools, most likely as Starfleet Academy is still much smaller than other twenty-fourth century universities. They have the luxury of taking the best of the best, and have only the facilities they need to do such a job. Just about everybody at the Naval Academy was captain of a team, or president of the student council.
But as has been pretty well established in Trek, instead of nominations from the Federation Council, applicants must procur them from Starfleet officers, which makes sense. I rather like the concept for the Star Trek universe actually. In which case, it might've been something like the following:
Wesley: Will you nominate me for the Academy, Captain Pickard?
Picard: GET THE FUCK OFF MY BRIDGE!
LATER...
Picard: Hey, Will, wanna hear something hilarious? Wesley wanted me to nominate him for the academy!
[They fall onto the floor and urinate themselves laughing so hard]
Riker: On the other hand, sir. It would get him off the ship and on the other side of the Federation.
Picard: Mmm, you make an interesting point. Make it so...
(as an interesting aside, it has been discussed more than once that when and if the United States were to form a space based service as an independent branch of the armed services, that Embry-Riddle would become it's academy. Such conversations always label the as yet unformed academy as Starfleet Academy, for obvious reasons. But if it did happen, I'd be the only one here able to claim that I graduated from Starfleet Academy. )
[ January 08, 2002: Message edited by: OnToMars ]
-------------------- If God didn't want us to fly, he wouldn't have given us Bernoulli's Principle.
Registered: Jun 2001
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I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
Aban.. I dont think we have enough information about populations & admittance standards for you to declare it doesnt make sense.. especially since OnToMars points out that that is exactly how academies work now.
And reading Starship Troopers did really change the way i think about how both Starfleet and present militaries work.. i'd recommend it to anyone who has a question on this (like whoever started this thread.. im too lazy to scroll and see)
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Registered: Sep 2001
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Well, OnToMars' post does make alot of sense, but since he posted it after I made my remarks, how exactly was I supposed to be taking his comment into consideration...?
Anyway. The point I'm making (or rather trying to make) is that the admissions standards in "Coming of Age" don't make sense when one considers other episodes that have touched on the issue. How does Wesley get rejected when (as was also pointed out by OnToMars) he's the son of two officers, he's already saved the Enterprise lord knows how many times, he's already an acting Ensign (right?). More importantly, how does he get rejected and someone like Tasha Tar get in? Wanna talk about backwater...Tasha was from God-forsaken hole of a colony. How many best of the best qualities do you think she displayed? I'm not saying that she didn't turn out to be a decent officer, I'm saying that, in light of all that, the standards Wesley and company were being measured under don't make alot of sense.
posted
I suppose it's possible that she was an enlisted security crewman and went through officer candidate school or something. But she seems awfully young to have served as a crewman for for a few years, gone back to school, then worked her way up to the rank of Lt. and the head of a department aboard the flagship.
quote:Originally posted by OnToMars: O'Brian: Sorry, ma'am. I did all I could.
[He pulls a phaser and melts the still functioning pad.]
He probably also pissed in the pattern buffer, just to be sure. Good old chief O'Brian.
I always thought it was kind weird that a bunch of Lts would be holding what would be considered very important and senior positions onboard the flagship of Starfleet. A Lt for chief engineer, and another for chief of security? Wouldn't they have prefered to have someone with a few more years under the belt taking such important positions?
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Registered: Apr 2001
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Member # 709
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Picard hand-picked Riker as his first officer and we're criticizing his choice of low-ranked engineers?
Not sure what Picard was thinking, but its pretty clear he hand-picked just about everyone (except maybe Bev Crusher.. she made him nervous). Tasha impressed him in the Carnellian minefield. Geordi impressed him on some shuttle trip. He liked young Lt. Cmdr Riker's service record of talking back to the center chair. It's pretty clear that Picard was in charge of picking his crew, and he picked talent over more established ranking officers. When the Galaxy class was originally commissioned, it was pictured as a long-range explorer with 20 year missions, so perhaps it was considered important to pick youthful crewpeople who would become seasoned on the way (of course the Romulans and the beginning of the Borg-era disrupted Starfleet's 'pure exploration' era of goals, so the Enterprise spent more time NOT exploring after season 3 and 4). And since Picard was picked specifically for his experience as a previous commander of a 20 year long range mission, he seems to have been given a lot of leeway.
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Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
I doubt Starfleet ships would literally get missions of "20 years thataway without crew rotation". Some might, but not the ones we would get to see up close in the shows... We got Voyager and we won't get another. Nevertheless, there would be a variety of excuses we could use for the variety of junior officers on the E-D.
Picard could handpick some people like Riker and Tasha. Some would be assigned because of the publicity value of having them aboard the Federation Flagship - Worf, at least, perhaps also Troi. The Chief Engineers could be juniors because this was a "training mission" for them - a new ship type for which a new breed of engineers had to be raised, explaining the rapid rotation of CEOs during the first season. The training period would then conveniently end when it was LaForge's turn to sit in that chair (Picard would see to it that this happened...).
Onboard training would be an issue on many hardwware-related positions on that ship - Ops, Conn etc. If the hardware was common with the rest of the fleet (transporters, shuttles, waste recycling, astrography?), then a more standard selection of already trained and senior personnel would be used.
posted
Good points Timo. Though it does seem that the Enterprise's original schedule was disprupted by political events. The Romulans. The Borg. Then later on, the Maquis and the Cardies.
Having plans for the ship to be out in the sticks for several years may also explain the presence of families, children, and other civilians on board.
Though, the Stargazer wasn't necessarily on a long range exploration mission. Apparently they were in the area during the Cardie Wars. Picard simply commanded that ship for that long.
And I'm still sticking with my opinion that he had another command between the Stargazer and the Enterprise
posted
Just saw "The Apple," thought it worth mentioning (unless someone here already has and I missed it): an Ensign Mallory (so credited, but wears a Lieutenant's stripe) dies; Kirk says Mallory's father was the one who recommended Kirk to the Academy.
posted
So, today's ep on E4 was "The Apple." Then, ronight's TNG ep on BBC2 is "Coming of Age." Spooky. This has been happening all week, the other day I needed to see "Mirror, Mirror" for a proposed Mirror Universe weapons page, guess what's that day's ep on E4? Plus the day before they showed "The Changeling," the only TOS ep I'd never seen. . .
posted
I've got a pic I want to send to you, Voggie. It's a shot from one of the desktop calendars of Jake from "Nor the Battle to the Strong". He's holding a kind of Phaser that I've never seen before. The scene must've been cut from the ep...I'm going to have to go find that tonight...
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