Posted on Jan 24, 2016
SGT Quality Control Technical Inspector
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1SG Civil Affairs Specialist
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According to AR 600-8-19, Para 3-19f -
f. Defense Language Proficiency Test. Twenty-five promotion points are granted to Soldiers who achieve a minimum limited working proficiency rating of 1/1 (listening, reading, or speaking) on the Defense Language Proficiency Test. Promotion points remain valid provided the Defense Language Proficiency Test proficiency standards do not exceed 1 year (year/month) as of the point compilation month.

So, according to the reg, it doesn't matter what language it is, you just need to attain a minimum proficiency. These points are under civilian education.
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The languages determine your likelihood of being promoted based on the needs of the service. I was a Navy Russian linguist and worked at joint commands for my entire career. The Army Russian linguists had a hard time reaching E7 whereas the Arabic linguist probably had a different experience reaching E9! Think of each language as a sub-MOS to the primary MOS. That's why the most literature regarding linguists say "language dependent".
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SGT Quality Control Technical Inspector
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Ah, I see. So basically choose a language that would benefit your career, over a language you would love to learn.
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Sadly, yes. I chose Russian and it served me well, but it didn't give longevity for my career. I was able to do things and participate in programs I could only have dreamed of, thanks to speaking Russian, that other languages would not have offered, but the work I did was outside of the needs of the Navy, and therefore, I sat at E6 for 7 years until I decided to punch out.
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In the Navy, we call it "choose your rate (MOS) choose your fate".
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SFC Intelligence Analyst
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SGT (Join to see) My suggestion is besides at looking at the news which will tell you which languages the Army probably needs (Arabic, Russian and Chinese at the top), go hrc.army.mil, enlisted promotions section and look at the current cutoff for 35p, and then also look at the trend report which will give you the average cutoff for all mos during the last year or so.
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When learning a new language, do the languages determine the amount of promotion points you get?
LTC Stephen Conway
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Edited >1 y ago
You can be safe to learn Chinese (Mandarin), Korean, Arabic, Farsi or Russian in today's world. I would learn Spanish since it is so common now in the USA and it is slowly a 2nd official language if its not going to be used in INTEL. It would be nice to go to DLI. My uncle was in Air Force Intelligence in the 1950s and he learned Hungarian at DLI and he was sent to the border during the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary after the government took its country back from the Warsaw PACT and the Russians came in months later with their tanks. He interviewed refugees. He retired as a LTC in the AF Reserve.
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SGT Quality Control Technical Inspector
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Hmm, thank you sir. That's definitely on my list.
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