The Corps now will let some enlisted Marines who have twice been passed over for promotion stay in the service, in a bid to boost retention.

The relaxation of the up-or-out policy, as the forcing out of troops who twice miss out on promotions is sometimes called, comes as Corps leadership is working to keep more experienced Marines in the service.

Effective July 1, the Marine Corps will start approving reenlistments and extensions for some enlisted Marines who twice don’t get promoted, the service announced in an administrative message June 16.

Up-or-out policies are designed to “encourage good performance, increase promotion opportunities, lower the average age of the service corps, and build a culture that defines success by promotion,” according to a 2005 Rand report.

But some have long seen up-or-out as an unfair or counterproductive system.

“Treating service members like so many widgets — in particular, the enlisted men and women who make up 85 percent of the ranks — is arbitrary and bad management,” Marine veteran Paul Kane wrote in The New York Times in 2009. “I have seen many fit, experienced officers and enlisted Marines arbitrarily forced out because there were only so many slots into which they could be promoted.”

Marine officials decided to make its policy more flexible in large part to retain troops with the technical skills needed for the more complex operations for which the Corps is preparing, according to the administrative message.

In the Marine Corps, promotions to the lower enlisted ranks of private first class and lance corporal aren’t competitive — they’re based on time in service and commanders’ approval.

But once a Marine tries to advance within the noncommissioned officer ranks, promotions become far from guaranteed. Promotion boards take into account rifle and martial arts scores, physical fitness, professional military education and evaluations from the command.

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Each military occupational specialty has a different number of available enlisted promotions, based on openings at each rank. For officers, in contrast, the number of promotions is typically determined by the number of openings across the service, rather than in each job field.

Even once the up-or-out policy is loosened, enlisted Marines who don’t get promoted will still be up against a ticking clock. The Corps still places limits on how long a Marine at a given rank can have served on active duty without a waiver, according to the Marine administrative message.

Those service limits are eight years for corporals, 12 years for sergeants, 20 years for staff sergeants, 22 years for gunnery sergeants, 27 years for first sergeants and master sergeants, and 30 years for sergeants major and master gunnery sergeants, according to the message.

The service limits constitute a maximum time in service, not a guarantee that all Marines can stay in for that long, the message cautioned.

“Eligibility for continued service remains based on Marine Corps warfighting requirements, individual performance, and personal conduct,” the message stated.

The Corps offers some exceptions to the service limits.

A Marine who is up against a service limit can seek a waiver, which has to be endorsed by a colonel, or, in the case of staff noncommissioned officers, by a general officer. And a Marine on a first enlistment may be granted a reenlistment of up to six years regardless of service limits, according to the message.

The administrative message also announced that the maximum age that enlisted Marines can be before they must retire would be increased, but inaccuracies in the section on this topic will prompt the Marine Corps to publish a corrected message sometime this week, according to Marine spokesman Maj. Jordan Cochran.

The message incorrectly listed that age as 59, rather than 58; the maximum age without a waiver was previously 55, according to Cochran. And the message incorrectly stated the maximum age of enlistment without a waiver was 29, rather than 28.

“Effective 1 July 2023, the maximum age limit for an enlisted Marine’s service is hereby 58 years old,” Cochran said in a statement to Marine Corps Times on Monday. “This change adheres to the Marine Corps Recruiting Command’s 28-year-old enlistment age guideline, allowing these Marines to serve a complete 30-year career subject to the demands of warfighting, individual performance, and personal conduct.”

Irene Loewenson is a staff reporter for Marine Corps Times. She joined Military Times as an editorial fellow in August 2022. She is a graduate of Williams College, where she was the editor-in-chief of the student newspaper.

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