Message from the Director

Good afternoon, NOAA Corps,

Many of you have been checking in with CPC recently, given that we have sustained several retirements of long-time and senior team members. Please know that your care and concern has not gone unnoticed, and the team that remains (myself included) all greatly appreciate your support. Bottom line: CPC remains dedicated to fulfilling all of our core mission functions in support of the NOAA Corps, and we expect the workforce to continue interfacing with us for all of their routine and unexpected career and personnel management needs alike. We are also proceeding down the path to bring onboard Basic Officer Training Class (BOTC) 147 in late summer, while BOTC 146 officer candidates are well on their way in their basic training pipeline, looking forward to Billet Night in less than a week!

In that vein, I’d like to highlight another hardworking element of CPC that helps facilitate our officer recruiting, accession, and assignment processes, the Officer Personnel Management Division (OPMD). In the career of a NOAA Corps officer, from swearing in all the way until the day they depart the service, there are literally hundreds of critical actions per individual that must be taken to ensure that an officer’s career is appropriately and accurately tracked and recorded. From appointments and promotions, to awards and personnel actions, our elite and mighty team of human resource specialists and assistants are the skilled operators of CPC’s human resource management system. Keeping up with changes in officer compensation, tracking and making adjustments related to permanent changes of station, and ultimately helping to facilitate the transition from active duty to post-service life amongst many other duties, OPMD ensures NOAA Corps records and pay actions are up-to-date while providing direct customer service and life-career consultation to our workforce. In addition to those duties, they also actively participate and remain plugged in on a wide variety of uniformed service impacting bodies, including but not limited to the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense Military Advisory Panel, providing advice to and presence for the Director on all things regarding benefits and entitlements.

I invite you to join me in celebrating and thanking our OPMD team - without them, the NOAA Corps would cease to function, and for their ongoing work and demonstrated commitment to our service, I am most grateful.

As always, please be sure to take care of yourselves and each other.

Best Regards,

Captain Chris van Westendorp, NOAA
Director, Commissioned Personnel Center

BOTC 146

BOTC 146 officer candidates in firefighting training (Credit: OC Banh)

Basic Officer Training Class 146 recently completed their four-week leading self phase. After completing Advanced Firefighting and Basic Seamanship, the class moves on to training for Compass, Aids To Navigation (ATONS), and Rules of the Road. Later this week, BOTC 146 will compete with their Coast Guard Officer Candidate School 3-25 classmates in the drill competition, and is excited to attend Survival Systems class in Groton, CT. Mariners have put in their preferences for initial sea assignments, and the class eagerly awaits their billet night results on June 5th, 2025.

Call for Interviewers - BOTC 148

The Commissioned Personnel Center is looking for motivated Officers (O2-O5) with at least three years of NOAA Corps service (as of today) willing to complete interviews for BOTC 148 applicants. We request each interviewer commit to conducting at least four interviews, which can be credited towards obtaining the NOAA Corps Recruiting Achievement Ribbon (see NCD 12705(E)).

All interviews occur via Google Meet and will be completed in the Mid-June to Mid-July timeframe. The current interview format will pair two officers together to conduct joint interviews for BOTC applicants, to better capture a range of perspectives. This is an incredible opportunity to have a direct hand in shaping the future of the NOAA Corps.

If interested, please use the NOAA Corps Interviews Google Form and indicate times you are unavailable during the interview window.

For any questions, please reach out to the Recruiting Branch via apply.noaacorps@noaa.gov.

From the UAB: What’s the deal with my new shoulder boards?

[By CAPT Samuel F. Greenaway, Co-Chair, Uniform & Awards Board]

Examples of NOAA Corps shoulder board insignia. Credit: CAPT S. Greenaway

The Uniform and Awards Board has received some recent complaints about shoulder boards and sleeve devices provided by sources such as the CutterAgent NOAA Store as well as from Vanguard. So we investigated! For the early years of my career, the only NOAA Corps insignia I ever saw looked like the one on the left: plain, shiny gold thread, lumpy triangle in the middle of a circle. But recent shoulder boards and insignia out of the NOAA Store looked more like the one on the right, prominent stitching, raised triangle with nice detail, lots of bling! The difference is the one on the right is made with “bullion stitching” and it certainly looks more luxurious. The folks at the NOAA Store had found an importer who could make the shoulder boards and other insignia using bullion stitching, but alas, that importer's health has reportedly declined and she is no longer in the business, so the NOAA Store has gone back to stocking the base-level Vanguard product.

The good news is you can order bullion stitched insignia directly from Vanguard as a non-stock item. As a non-stock item, they don’t have stock numbers, but you can call them up and tell them what you are after. I recently ordered a few sets of bullion boards. They didn’t look great so I sent them back for rework, which Vanguard was happy to do. The NOAA Store is also trying to locate a different provider. But perhaps the easiest answer is: if you have nice boards that you have been promoted out of, give them to a needy junior officer and keep that bling in service!

Reminder: Merchant Mariner Credential Fee Waiver

Do you already have, or are you interested in, obtaining your Merchant Mariner Credential (MMC) from the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG)? Well there’s no time like now to follow up with renewing, upgrading or acquiring your MMC. The National Defense Authorization Act for FY2020 (NDAA 2020) instructed the USCG to waive evaluation, examination and issuance fees associated with MMCs for all members of the uniformed services on active duty. In November of 2024 the final ruling went into effect and NOAA Corps Officers are now able to take advantage of this waiver policy!

When requesting a sea service memo through OPF Online (Open HR Action Request > Correspondence > Sea Service Memo), CPC will also provide documentation establishing your drug testing compliance and eligibility for the fee waiver. If only the fee waiver memo is needed and not a sea service memo, officers should include that information as a comment in the request ticket.

For NOAA Corps MMC questions, please contact OPMD Staff Officer LT Gabriel Johnson (gabriel.johnson@noaa.gov).