The Army Skillport system is one of the easiest and fastest ways to get Army promotion points. I, personally, sat and watched TV for an entire weekend and maxed out my promotion points. At first glance, the system can be a little overwhelming. There are so many courses to choose from and so many different topics.
The Army has, yet again, created a route to promotion points that can be cheated. Shh… don’t tell anyone. If you took as long as the Army Skillport courses were supposed to take you; you would spend all your time as a lower enlisted in front of your computer.
Army Skillport Promotion Points
Promotion points for Army Skillport courses fall into the category of Computer Based Training. Due to so many soldiers maxing out their Military Education promotion points without ever attending an NCO school; the Army placed a maximum on the Computer Based Training. This maximum is currently at 78 promotion points for SGT and 84 for SSG.
Army Skillport Maximum Hours
Every 5 hours completed in the Army Skillport system is worth 1 promotion point. For a soldier recommended for SGT, you need 390 hours of Army Skillport to max out your Computer Based Training promotion points. This number for SSG is 420 hours.
Structured Self Development 1
SSD1 is a computer based course that is now required for promotion to SGT (E-5). This course is done in the ALMS system not the Army Skillport website. However, it needs to be discussed because it affects how many Army Skillport hours you actually need to complete to max out your Computer Based Training promotion points.
For those recommended to SGT, SSD1 is worth 80 hours (16 promotion points). For those recommended to SSG, it is not worth anything and there is no equivalent until you are recommended for SFC. This means that those recommended to SGT have 80 hours less to do to max out their computer based training points. Since SSD is a requirement for promotion, this just helps out the SPC(P). You can now max out your computer course hours with 310 Army Skillport hours (62 promotion points).
[Correction: SSD1 is no longer worth promotion points. It is still a requirement to go to WLC though.]
Easiest Army Skillport Courses
If you have been around the block a few times, you have been told by everyone and their mother to do the Microsoft courses on Skillport. Am I right? It is true that these are the easiest courses to do, but only if someone has shown you the cheats to get through them faster. If you don’t use my cheat tips, these courses are just as bad as all the others if you don’t know anything about Microsoft.
Where to Find the Army Skillport Microsoft Courses
If you have already registered for Army Skillport E-learning, go ahead and log in now. If you haven’t, follow my .
This should be the screen you see when you log on to Army Skillport and click “Catalog”. The Microsoft courses are located in the “Desktop Certifications” folder. Once you click on that folder, you will have to keep clicking on folders until you reach the actual courses. Each individual course has a little computer screen next to it on the left and a little green dot to the right once it is completed.
Army Skillport Cheating
Army Skillport cheating is not possible like it used to be in the Army correspondence courses. There is no website available with all of the answers and I can’t give them to you either. Skillport is designed so that there is no specific set of questions for all soldiers. So, my method isn’t really cheating. It is just a loophole in the system.
1. Click on your first course. You will then see all the information about the course; including the course hours. Most of the Microsoft courses are listed in minutes; but we all know that 60 minutes is equal to an hour. The hours/minutes that the course is worth is listed under “Expected Duration”. You may want to write down the hours or minutes before you start each course because it doesn’t tell you the course length where your completed courses are listed. The only way to see where you stand for hours is to wait for them to show up on your ERB and PPW. But, if you’re doing all your courses at once, you will want to know an accurate number.
This is what you will see when you click on your first Army Skillport course.
2. After you have written down the hours, click on the blue triangle, that looks like a “play” button, to launch the course. (Picture above.)
3. Inside of the launched course, you will see a listing of all the sub-courses. These are the courses that must be done before you can get credit for the whole course. Instead of clicking “Begin Course” at the bottom, click “Take Course Test”. This is where the tricks comes in. (The screen shot below shows my course as complete-please ignore). You can also choose to take each individual course test, but I prefer the whole course test.
4. On the next screen, you will see your score for the course and for each sub-course. Once again, yours will not have scores like mine because mine is complete. You must get a 70% overall but also a 70% in each sub-course. When you are ready to start, click “Take Test”.
5. At this point you can decide what works best for you. There are a few different methods you can try.
- Click, Click, Click. Just click a random answer and click “done” for every question on the test and then “next” to get to the next question. I like “C” for the multiple choice and checking all of the boxes for the ones that have more than one correct answer. Now, you can either just keep clicking through until you are done, or note the correct answers. I like to just click through. After you are done, you have the option to “Retake Incomplete/Failed Parts”. Usually, it ends up making me retake about 3/4 the test. You can either repeat what you have already done and choose a different letter to click every time, or if you took notes, click the right answers.
- Pictures/Notes. Once you have clicked “done” on each question, the correct answer is marked even if you don’t choose an answer. Once the answer pops up, take a picture of the screen or write down the correct answer. Click “next” to get to the next question. After you have went through the whole test, you can choose to retake the test. Just look at the pictures/notes you took and get the answers right this time.
The Army Skillport system gives you the answers.
Using these methods, I have noticed an average of about 3-5 minutes to every hour. This means that if a course has an estimated duration of 60 minutes, it takes me 3-5 minutes. So, in theory I could finish all 390 hours for SGT in 20 to 30 hours. Not bad for 78 promotion points right?
