The E-8 and E-9 selection board for fiscal year 2020 greenlighted 292 Selected Reserve and Full-Time Support sailors to advance.
Unfortunately, the combination of fewer quotas and a rise in the number of sailors eligible to move up lowered the chances for reservists in both pay grades advance.
Convening on March 4 in Millington, Tennessee, the board met for 10 days to sift through advancement packages submitted by both drilling reservists and those in the full-time support community.
It’s the only enlisted selection board that considers multiple pay grades for advancement.
Only 9 percent of eligible drilling reserve senior chiefs will advance, down from last year’s 11 percent rate.
The Navy counted 450 eligible senior chiefs competing for just 41 quotas. Last year only 398 eligible E-8s were vying for 45 advancement slots.
Click here to check out the Selected Reserve E-9 advancements.
A similar fate befell eligible sailors in the Selected Reserve’s E-8 grade, where the chance to advance also tumbled from 11 percent to 9 percent.
A rise in the number of candidates — 1,920 eligible drilling reserve chief petty officers, up from last year’s 1,672 candidates — competed for only 174 positions, down from 189 last year.
Check out the Selected Reserve E-8 advancements here.
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The Full-Time Support community is small, with a total strength of slightly more than 12,000 enlisted personnel.
The board approved 23 of 106 eligible FTS senior chief reservists to advance to E-9.
Last year, nearly 30 percent of eligible senior chiefs were advanced but this year the rate fell to 22 percent.
Although the number of eligible senior chiefs being reviewed fell by four, the number of quotas dropped by nine.
For FTS chiefs hoping to become senior chiefs, the advancement rate fell from last year’s 9 percent to just under 8 percent.
That’s because although the pool of eligible FTS chiefs dipped to 705 this year — 37 fewer than last year — the number of quotas plummeted from 66 to 54.
Check out the Reserve Full-Time Support E-9 and E-8 advancements here.
Mark D. Faram is a former reporter for Navy Times. He was a senior writer covering personnel, cultural and historical issues. A nine-year active duty Navy veteran, Faram served from 1978 to 1987 as a Navy Diver and photographer.
