Information Systems Technician, Submarines, Network

The Information Systems Technician, Submarines, Network (ITN) rating is one of the three service ratings the Navy stood up under NAVADMIN 257/23, which split the legacy Information Systems Technician, Submarines (ITS) rating into Network (ITN), Communications (ITR), and Electronic Warfare (ITE) tracks. The Navy's occupational standards list the rating as Information Systems Technicians, Submarines, Network (ITN). Every submarine IT Sailor still shares a common foundation in shipboard local area networks, but ITNs go deep on the network-administration side: standing up and sustaining the afloat and enterprise networks the boat fights on, configuring routers and switches, hardening systems against intrusion, and keeping data and net-centric services available underway and in port. The first ITN advancement exam ran in February 2025, Cycle 116.

If you held the ITN rating, your day-to-day was network engineering under real constraints. You administered Windows and Linux server environments, managed Active Directory accounts and group policy, segmented and monitored networks, applied IAVAs and STIGs, troubleshot routing and switching faults on Cisco gear, and restored services when a casualty took a node down with no off-hull help to call. That blend of hands-on administration plus cybersecurity discipline plus accountability for systems that cannot fail is exactly what civilian network and infrastructure employers pay for. Many ITNs leave the Navy holding CompTIA Security+ and Network+, and some pursue Cisco CCNA credentials through Navy COOL, which 51 mapped credentials support for the rating.

This page is for Sailors who held ITN and are figuring out what comes next. If you want to stay in network administration, systems administration, or cybersecurity, your direct civilian matches and the companies that hire this background are below. If you want out of IT entirely, the career-change section maps your distinctive skill set to fields you might not expect. Related Navy ratings worth a look are the general IT Information Systems Technician and the parent submarine rating ITS Information Systems Technician (Submarine). You can also explore every rating through the military-to-civilian career crosswalk, or read how veterans break into tech without a degree.

Across the 60,000-plus resumes BMR has built, ITNs are some of the cleaner network-administration translations we see, because the work is already enterprise network admin in everything but the vocabulary. The trick is writing "administered Active Directory and Cisco routing for an afloat network" in language a civilian hiring team reads as "network administrator," not "submarine technician." Get that translation right and the Security+ does the rest. — Brad Tachi, Navy Diver veteran & BMR founder

The civilian network and infrastructure market rewards the exact skill set ITNs build underway. Below are direct matches with median pay from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2024.

Network and Computer Systems Administrator is the closest 1:1. BLS reports a median wage of $96,800 for this occupation (O*NET 15-1244.00). The role is configuring, monitoring, and securing the same routing, switching, and server stack you ran on the boat. Computer Network Support Specialist (O*NET 15-1231.00) sits one step down at a BLS median of $75,380 and is a common first civilian title for newly separated ITNs who want to keep their hands on the gear.

If you leaned into the security side of the rating, Information Security Analyst (O*NET 15-1212.00) carries a BLS median of $124,910 with much-faster-than-average projected growth. Your STIG, IAVA, and network-hardening experience maps directly. Network Architect (O*NET 15-1241.00) is a senior destination at a BLS median of $130,390, realistic a few years out once you pair the field experience with design credentials. Computer Systems Analyst (O*NET 15-1211.00, BLS median $103,790) and Database Administrator (O*NET 15-1242.00, BLS median $101,510) round out the direct paths.

Be honest with yourself about geography and clearance. The highest-paying network and security roles cluster around the DC metro, San Antonio, San Diego, and Norfolk, where cleared work concentrates. A current clearance plus afloat network experience is a strong combination there. Outside cleared markets the salary bands compress, and entry-level support roles can be competitive. Cross-branch, the same civilian paths open from Army 25B Information Technology Specialist, Air Force 3D0X2 Cyber Systems Operations, and Marine 0651 Cyber Network Operator. To start framing your experience for these roles, the military resume builder structures the translation, or you can build your resume now.

Federal IT hiring runs almost entirely through one series, and an ITN background lines up with it cleanly. The GS-2210 Information Technology Management series is the home for network administration, systems administration, and cybersecurity work across DoD and the wider federal government. The 2210 series uses specialty parenthetical titles, and ITNs map most directly to the Network Services, Systems Administration, and Information Security parentheticals. With afloat network experience plus a Security+ that satisfies the DoD 8140 baseline, GS-2210 roles at the GS-9 through GS-12 range are realistic targets, with GS-7 as a common entry rung for those just out.

Adjacent series widen the search. GS-0391 Telecommunications and GS-0392 General Telecommunications fit the transport and communications-network side of the work. GS-2299 Information Technology Student Trainee aside, the technical-depth options include GS-0854 Computer Engineering and GS-1550 Computer Science if you carry a qualifying degree, and GS-0855 Electronics Engineering for those who worked the hardware layer. GS-0301 Miscellaneous Administration and Program shows up for IT-adjacent program roles.

Veterans' Preference applies across all of these. If you separated with a campaign medal or a qualifying service-connected condition, that preference adds points and can place you ahead of non-veteran candidates with similar scores. VEOA eligibility also opens merit-promotion announcements normally closed to the public. The federal resume is its own format with its own rules, longer and more detailed than a private-sector resume. The GS-2210 IT Specialist resume guide and the DoD 8140 certification breakdown cover the specifics, and the federal resume builder handles the format. When you are ready, start your federal resume.

If you are staying in network administration, systems administration, or cybersecurity, your terminology already translates. Hiring managers at MSPs, defense contractors, and IT shops know what Active Directory, VLANs, and STIGs are. This section is for ITNs targeting careers OUTSIDE IT, where a hiring manager has never heard your Navy vocabulary and reads it as a foreign language.

The fix is to describe the outcome in civilian business terms, not the Navy system name. A few mappings:

• IAVA / STIG compliance becomes security policy compliance and risk remediation. The skill is enforcing a standard and closing findings on a deadline, which translates to any regulated industry.
• Casualty restoration underway becomes incident response and service restoration under pressure. You diagnosed and recovered critical systems with no outside support, which is the core of any operations or reliability role.
• Network watch / underway rotation becomes 24/7 operations and on-call system monitoring.
• Afloat LAN administration becomes enterprise infrastructure management for a self-contained, high-availability environment.

Two before-and-after resume bullets for non-IT roles:

Before: "Maintained shipboard LAN and applied IAVAs during deployment."
After: "Sustained a 200-user high-availability network with zero unplanned downtime across a six-month deployment, enforcing security compliance standards on a fixed remediation schedule."

Before: "Stood network watch and restored casualties."
After: "Led 24/7 monitoring of mission-critical systems, diagnosing and restoring outages within service-level targets without external support."

For more on rewriting military language, the 50 military terms translated to civilian language glossary is a useful reference, and the military resume builder walks the translation line by line. When the bullets are ready, build your resume now.