Rocketry before Mitchell

[cadetmom]

I have a question about the Rocketry Badge.  Is there some importance of completing rocketry before a cadet earns his/her Mitchell award?  That's where my cadet is right now.  He's holding off on taking the aerospace portion of the Mitchell exam, which is all he has left to complete, until he earns his rocketry badge.  He's been told that there is some benefit to having the rocketry completed before the Mitchell but we can't find any information about that.

[jeders]

There is absolutely no benefit to completing the model rocketry badge before he gets his Mitchell award. However, he may wear a silver star on his Goddard Ribbon AFTER he gets his Mitchell award and has completed the model rocketry program.

[TheSkyHornet]

Bad gouge.

As jeders said, the information is reversed: You get extra "bling" when achieving the Mitchell, not less.

For future reference: Cadets should not be suggested to hold themselves back from promoting. Part of the Cadet Oath is to advance their training and education. That (progressing) should be strongly encouraged.

[cadetmom]

Thanks for that.  I kept hearing that he should wait because it will look better on his resume if the rocketry is completed before but I couldn't read that anywhere.

[TheSkyHornet]

That sounds like cadets saying/doing cadet things.

[cadetmom]

That's what I suspected 

[baronet68]

Long ago, before some of today's cadets' parents were even born... there was some motivation to complete the rocketry badge before the Mitchell because the achievement that used to immediately precede the Mitchell was named after Dr. Robert Goddard (the Father of Modern Rocketry) and the ribbon of that era actually had an image of a rocket:



Like today, once the cadet earned both the rocketry badge and the Mitchell Award, a silver star was added to the Goddard ribbon: