ABSTRACT
Historically, a military aptitude grade measured a midshipman's potential for a naval career. In July 1976, this measuring system was renamed the "military performance grade," but it remained a composite of various ratings. Midshipmen officers in the brigade evaluate other midshipmen within their platoons. The company officer, a naval officer, is ultimately responsible for writing each midshipman's military performance sheet, and he determines the weights to give these evaluations. A major hypothesis tested in study is that midshipmen who aspire to high rank or to long careers will tend to be overrepresented in the upper ranges of the military performance grades. One might hypothesize that midshipmen with conservative social and political attitudes would naturally be more compatible with the military style and would receive higher aptitude grades than midshipmen with liberal attitudes. There is no statistically significant relationship between military performance and fathers' occupations.
