Army Military postpones start of summer recruit school from 2027

From 2027, the summer recruit school is to start six weeks later than before. The Swiss Armed Forces want to ensure that apprenticeship graduates start their military training more seamlessly and that there are fewer bottlenecks, as they announced on Thursday.

Most apprenticeship contracts will run until the end of July, i.e. calendar week 31, but the summer recruit school will now begin in week 27, the Federal Department of Defense, Civil Protection and Sport (DDPS) continued in its press release. As a result, many prospective recruits have decided to start recruit school six months later.

As a result, according to the army, the two RS starts are working to different capacities, which leads to infrastructural and personnel challenges. The postponement of the start of the second recruit school to calendar week 33 should now help to reduce such bottlenecks.

According to the army, another advantage is that the prospective recruits will have a break of three weeks during the course of their training at both RS starts. Previously, the breaks varied in length depending on the RS start, it added.

In addition, the adjustment to the duty roster means that departing and new conscript formations overlap. Previously, according to the DDPS, the readiness of the army had to be ensured by troops on a refresher course (WK) when there were no active-duty units on duty.

SDA