I need advice

Ehh, alright, someone who also doesn’t have a lot of experience figuring things out, but regardless, I’d say the signs of spending more on tuition than you should and failing the classes of your major are probably bad ones, primarily if for the major of choice you wouldn’t necessarily be sure of what you are doing it for and you’d feel tempted to switch to an easier one due to that.

Major choices are best taken very holistically in general in my opinion, everything from what specific courses it requires you to take (because regardless of the major some classes are more useful than others to all people) to what that’s going to be leading you into topic matter wise, career stuff having room for exploration and pivoting but the degree topic is what you start out with usually. Of course, when “major choices” are mentioned, that’s in multiple ways, both in terms of the college major and other decisions of that magnitude, and military enlistment is obviously one of them. Thing is though, such a thing requires a similar level of looking into being a similar level of big decision. At least in the United States, you have a minimum of 4 years or so before you can withdraw and be considered a veteran and all, although it also differs by service branch, and choosing your service branch here also determines a lot, so either way you’ll be putting some thought into it.

At that rate it’s more so that with whatever you pick, you can follow through over time. Enlisting is certainly an option (alongside commissioning as an officer, in which case ROTC may also be worth looking into, it’s good to know the difference), but odds are most likely it’s not even the best route to those attributes you assign to it. The potential lack of flexibility being stationed at a certain location or base for example (even though, yes, there are various workarounds with that if you do decide to enlist, so nothing is ever really 100% the case there) may have you preferring the regular civilian commute times to and from work, in which on the civilian side there are also more options in terms of working remotely, so it’s not like the basis you’d be operating on with the military is the most up to date. And that makes sense, to some degree they do need you there physically. That’s kind of why I as of now have thought twice about it honestly, because in addition to that buffer time which I would think isn’t making the best use of it, instruction may ultimately be too generalized and not necessarily focused on what you are after knowledge wise. Yes, as far as I am aware all branches are probably generous with education opportunities, but as far as I can tell that’s only in terms of the certifications (such as bachelor’s degrees and above) in comparison to the topic matter of choice and the content you engage with. Not going to be the cream of the crop I’d assume, they aren’t focused on that, and I’d also assume (these are a lot of assumptions for someone who hasn’t been in the military, haha…) that those certifications are just for an easier time transitioning back into the civilian sector and life, after you get out, if you do decide to leave in 4 years instead of a decade or two. Some people do stay, and uh, if you do, I mean, I can’t say your odds of getting “the best deals” are necessarily high there. Even if you can make military stuff work out while also going into specialized territory, simply taking up roles for a certain field and just having the branches be the places in where you act, you know?

You’d have a way easier time specializing or pretty much gaining knowledge in anything on your own instead of any government focused roles in general really, I guess that’s what I’m saying. It’s a bit unfortunate but a lot of the time the easiest, “tried and true” methods against the “weakest links” in the chains are made use of the most. That gets to the point in which you may just “see and know it all” rather quickly due to that repetitiveness.

Once again, all things that are said from the outside looking in really, I’ve done some looking around but ultimately I didn’t decide to enlist in anything military or government related. There have been quite the fair share of technological advancements and groupings of knowledgeable people in settings that were entirely military focused, I know that in the past for instance the Navy here sort of had a monopoly with electrical engineers in terms of dealings with the IEEE and furthermore how many related things of that topic I’ve seen from them, in which there are a few happenings, but it’s still to be noted that it happened a few times. I would assume that they leaned more towards the communications and power systems sort of side in comparison to any computers we have today for instance, but that’s besides the point. Despite the contradicting evidence, if you go in, expect to stay for only the minimum at the start UNLESS all the circumstances line up just right to where they may be showing you more than what’s outside of there, but that’s rare.

You can also just not enlist or commission and put those four years to better use honestly, since generalized instruction kind of pales in comparison to specialized instruction and showing yourself how things are done and all. When you have a one size fits all approach, even at the very start, that’s losing out on a more streamlined process which could be especially more applicable to yourself. But that of course requires knowledge of yourself, which goes back to the point in which, whatever you pick, you follow through with it over time. What’s the most likely thing in terms of that is the question I would be asking probably.