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Sat
28
May

Education Action: Reining in Military Recruiting

Santa Barbara public school

by Seth Kershner

In 2012, Kate Connell—a photographer with two children in the Santa Barbara public schools—learned that her son’s freshman seminar had a Marine recruiter as a guest speaker. Her son had challenged the recruiter, saying he didn’t like the way the U.S. military was always bombing other countries. At first, Connell thought, “Oh, it’s great you spoke up for yourself and spoke up for peace.”

Her second reaction was: “Oh, my gosh! The Marines were in his freshman class!”

Connell had a long, but dormant, history as an anti-war activist. When the Gulf War started in 1991, she was living in New York City, and she volunteered with the War Resisters League (WRL). Her main job with WRL was helping active-duty military file for conscientious objector status. Later, she relocated to Austin, Texas, where whe worked with Sustainable Options for Youth, visiting local high schools to stimulate discussions with students about “military myths.”

Sun
03
Apr

Military recruiting in public schools can be disruptive

NEW YORK, NY - NOVEMBER 11: Members of the U.S. Navy march with the American Flag in the the nation's largest Veterans Day Parade in New York City on November 11, 2015 in New York City. Known as "America's Parade" it features over 20,000 participants, including veterans of numerous eras, military units, businesses and high school bands and civic and youth groups. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images) (Credit: Getty Images / Spencer Platt)

By J.B. McGeever

The local Army recruiter is at my classroom door, and I wish he’d stop doing this. He needs to speak to a student in my English class at Jamaica High School.

When I explain that there are designated areas for him to speak with potential recruits, he apologizes. In fact, his etiquette is always spit-shined and gleaming, like something he’s learned at a seminar. He shows me his visitor’s pass, smoothed against a lapel, and apologizes once more. Never again, he says. It’s just that this time it’s important. Could he please have a word with Ernesto?

I like to believe I have the final say on these matters, but Ernesto is already out of his seat and calling the man “sir.” His slouch has been corrected and a hand keeps his jeans from dropping below the waist. They shake hands and a heartbreaking glow washes over his face. I shut the door while they confer in the hallway.

Tue
19
Jan

SkoolLive - School Jive - A new, interactive digital invasion of our high schools by corporations and the military

High school students line up to use the new SkoolLive kiosks

Pat Elder -

For years DOD recruiting commanders have attempted to circumvent student privacy protections that are designed to shield minors from the wholesale transfer of student information from the nation's high schools to the Pentagon's Military Entrance Processing Command.

The DOD markets "career opportunities" through the schools, relying on a variety of methods, from Channel One, a 12-minute, highly commercialized, daily TV program that reaches as many as 5 million children a day, to various posters and announcements touting military service or other schemes like the Career Exploration Program. For the most part, however, these outreach efforts ultimately rely on the schools as a third party from which to extract student data. Until now, the DOD's quest for greater access to children has been somewhat stymied by pesky state and federal laws that regulate the flow of student information from the schools.

Thu
26
Nov

DoD Starbase Militarizes Education for Disadvantaged Children in the USA

2014 DoD Starbase Annual Report

The U.S. Department of Defense recently released their 2014 DoD Starbase Annual Report covering this program's impact on 10 to 14 year old children in U.S. public schools. One of the Starbase organizers is Major General  Lee Tafanelli, of the Kansas National Guard, and his comments reveal how normalized and commonplace has become the language of militarization inside U.S. Schools. As part of the "community covenant " strategy of the Pentagon to "own" townships and school districts to support and participate in military focused science and math programs, children are now openly given science education directly related to defense issues. Starbase proponents focus their outreach in poorer districts , where children are at greater risk to conditions of poverty or lack opportunities afforded to youth living in more affluent areas and attending better funded schools.

Mon
14
Sep

America’s Tween Soldiers

August Say, 12, holds out his arm to determine where he should stand in class in the new Dragon Leadership Corps at his middle school in Bowling Green, Ohio.

Seth Kershner, In These Times

Last year, Henry F. Moss Middle School in Bowling Green, Ohio, offered students a brand new course. And, as a headline in the local newspaper proclaimed, this was “not your traditional class.” For starters, the teacher—an army sergeant—had told the Bowling Green Daily News that one of his goals was to expose these seventh- and eighth-graders to “military values” that they could use as “building blocks” in life. To that end, students in the class earn military style ranks, engage in army-style “PT” (physical training) and each Wednesday, wear camouflage pants and boots.

This is the Moss Middle School Leadership Corps, part of the growing trend of military-style education for pre-adolescents.

Tue
30
Jun

Halt the military invasion of Catholic schools

Flickr photo cc by Debra Sweet

By Pat Elder

Tue
18
Mar

Counter-recruitment and School Demilitarization Activism: From Past Victories to the Challenges Ahead

Education Not Arms Coalition: In the audience are about 70 students, parents and others showing their support for the policy

Rick Jahnkow -

Counter-recruitment and school demilitarization work in the U.S. has gone through several cycles of expansion and contraction during the last few decades. The first expansion was during the early 1980s when it was supported by a small number of national organizations, such as the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), War Resisters League, Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors (CCCO) and National Lawyers Guild. Most grassroots activities at the time were carried out by chapters of these organizations and a number of independent community peace groups (including COMD and, eventually, Project YANO).

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