Royal Military Academy Sandhurst

The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst (RMAS), commonly known simply as Sandhurst, is the British Army officer initial training centre. Sandhurst is prestigious and has had many famous alumni including Sir Winston Churchill, King Abdullah II of Jordan, Sultan Qaboos of Oman and, more recently, Prince Henry of Wales and Prince William of Wales. All British Army officers, and many from elsewhere in the world, are trained at Sandhurst.

The Academy opened its doors in 1947 in the former Royal Military College (RMC) at Sandhurst. The Academy straddles the border between the counties of Berkshire and Surrey, marked by a small stream known as the Wish Stream, after which the Academy journal is named.

Sandhurst, unlike some other national military academies such as West Point in the United States or the Australian Defence Force Academy, is not a university. Entrants are expected to already be university graduates, although this is not an absolute requirement. This can be seen by the cases of Prince William, who was a university graduate when he entered Sandhurst, and his brother Prince Harry, who was not. The British Armed Forces operate a sixth form college, Welbeck, which prepares candidates for engineering degrees at civilian universities. It is expected that such students will move on to Sandhurst, Dartmouth or Cranwell after completion of their degrees.

Courses

The Commissioning Course, lasting 44 weeks, must be passed by all British regular army officers (with some exceptions) before they receive their commission. It is usually preceded by the Army Officer Selection Board and followed by a further training course specific to the Regiment or Corps the officer will serve in. Shorter commissioning courses are run for 'professionally qualified officers' (eg, doctors, dentists, nurses, lawyers, vets and chaplains) and Territorial Army officers. This shorter course, lasting just four weeks, is known colloquially as the 'Vicars and Tarts' course.

Sandhurst also runs a variety of other courses for officers, most notably the Late Entry Officer Course (LEOC), and has renowned academic departments staffed by civilian lecturers.

All officer cadets who complete the full Commissioning Course are eligible to become Licentiate (part qualified) members of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) as the course satisfies the requirements of the CIPD's Core Management programme.

Organisation

In overall charge of the RMAS is the Commandant, usually an officer of Major-General rank, while the Academy Sergeant Major (AcSM) is the most senior individual warrant officer in the British Army (only Conductors of the Royal Logistic Corps rank higher than the AcSM, but there are several of them at any one time). The RMAS has courses which start in January, May and September of each year. Each intake numbers approximately 270 students, each of whom joins a company. Each commissioning course is split up into three terms, each lasting fourteen weeks, and on each commissioning course cadets are put into one of three companies. There can be as many as ten companies within the RMAS at any one time, each commanded by a Major and named after a famous battle in which the British Army has fought. The company names vary but are currently :

• Gaza Company
  Image:Oldcollegesandhurst2.jpg

  The 149th Sovereign's Parade in front of Old College
• The Somme Company
• Ypres Company
• Alamein Company
• Burma Company
• Normandy Company
• The Falklands Company
• Imjin Company
• Malaya Company
• Dettingen Company - the Short Courses mentioned above (for Territorial Army and Professionally Qualified Officers) are operated sequentially, and are each known as 'Dettingen Company'.

Within a company are three platoons each of thirty officer cadets, commanded by a Captain and supported by a Colour Sergeant. Dettingen Company is divided along the same lines as the regular intakes, though smaller courses may consist of only two platoons.

There also exists a "rehabilitation" platoon at Sandhurst called Lucknow Platoon, which looks after cadets who are injured during training, with a view to preparing them to re-enter the commissioning course or processing those who are medically discharged.

Regular Army

A small number of regular army units are based at the RMAS to provide support for the college and its training operations:

• Gurkha Demonstration Company (Sitang): This is a company sized unit drawn from all units of the Brigade of Gurkhas, to provide realistic battle training for the cadets.
• 44 Support Squadron, Royal Logistic Corps: This is the RMAS's permanently based transport, logistic and signals support unit.

History

The RMA Sandhurst was formed in 1947, from a merger of the Royal Military Academy in Woolwich (which trained officers for the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers from 1741 to 1939) and the Royal Military College at Sandhurst. Following the ending of National Service in the UK, the RMAS became the sole establishment for initial officer training in the British Army as the Mons Officer Training School in Aldershot was closed.

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