The service required parents to accept that their sons could be assigned to any of the three branches and promised to consider preference only after every branch was filled. That policy made common entry a manpower-distribution tool as well as an educational reform. A 1905 letter to Fisher reports that parents hoped their sons would avoid engineering because they believed it closed the route to ship and fleet command. Some may even have discouraged engineering study, exposing the social and career incentives the scheme had to overcome.
Notable Point · 1:19:49-1:22:34
Branch choice collided with family expectations
The Admiralty required entrants to accept any branch, but some families resisted engineering appointments that seemed to close the route to command.