What are the pros and cons of 35P Cryptolinguist?

I'm a Korean 35P.

Pros:
* The Army pays you to learn a language.
* Monterey is an awesome place to live.
* If you do well in class you can go on immersion in another country.
* Language pay is nice.
* Having a clearance is helpful for jobs outside the military.

Cons:
* DLI is hard. Like really fucking hard. Half my class didn't graduate.
* Having to take the DLPT every year to remain MOS qualified is very stressful.
* Your unit might not care about giving you language training.
* Depending where you go you might never use your language.
* Promotions for 35P is very, very slow.

The other guy already answered everything, so I'll just flesh out a few points:

You learn a lot about yourself at DLI. Being a good student prior to life at DLI isn't a great indicator of how well you'll do when you get there. Language acquisition generally tends to be harder for those who don't grow up in a bilingual environment, so be aware of that. I was able to absorb Arabic like a sponge because the language type, Verb-Subject-Object, is like my native language... However, the attrition rate is high and a lot of my friends failed either because they were never exposed to other languages (and subsequently could not process the influx of daily vocab fast enough), or they simply could not pass the hearing tests; I had to watch many of them reclass elsewhere.

If you don't move to a BfSB after your MOS and language qualifications are over, you'll have to fight your unit to allow you into refresher courses prior to each DLPT you take.

Always strive to be the best. Only the best in your graduating class is chosen for language immersion in another country. I was able to go to immersion with a bunch of airmen and a few seamen prior to graduation. The experience really forces you to think in another language. The standard versions of languages taught at DLI are not the way people speak in their daily vernacular, much like how no one really speaks standard English. We use spelling and grammatical rules and norms to communicate in writing, but our different pronunciations of words (dependent upon the regions we're from), our word choices, and the advent of technologies that spread online speak faster through social media, all contribute to a deviation from the standard. If you are able to spot the differences in English, then speaking in your target language within a native speaking country will help illuminate the differences between the ideal version of the language you are taught and the reality you face once you start doing the job.

One cool thing about 35P is that there are times during deployment where a SFG will put out a request to your overarching unit for someone like you to assist in their missions, and if you are the best, you'll get to join the SFG on missions and see how they operate too.

The biggest pros for me are two things: 1. You learn a language that you can keep with you forever as a skillset if you maintain it, and 2. You need a TS/SCI to work in this field, which is a huge plus when you start thinking about life outside the Army. Oh, and 3. Your time at DLI is considered college credit (as well as your time in the Army in general), so it only took me 2 years' worth of school to get a BA, saving a lot of my GI Bill for graduate studies.