FTAP Effectiveness

Very little argument exists amongst Marines on the question of whether the Marine Corps recruits and trains a high quality first-term force. There is much debate, however, on how well the Corps is doing at maintaining the quality of this force through its retention efforts. There is much anecdotal evidence that indicates that the Corps is failing to retain its best people, thus weakening the quality of the career force. On the contrary, the First Term Alignment Program FTAP is actually building a strong enlisted career force by retaining the best Marines, reducing the population of underperforming Marines, and reenlisting a population whose average performance is better than the first-term population it was drawn from.