Several years ago, while doing a Skype session about
my book, The Wave, with a 9th
grade class in Mississippi, I noticed that among the students sitting at their
desks, half a dozen were wearing uniforms comprised of a light blue shirt and
dark slacks. I asked the students about
their uniforms, and they told me that they members of their high school’s unit
of the U.S. Army Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC).
I was not familiar with the JROTC but it struck me as
curious that an organization sponsored by the United States Military would be
allowed in a public school to solicit members who were 14 and 15 years old.
That is, students who were still basically children.
It raised questions in my mind: At what age should the
US military be allowed to begin the indoctrination of young people? Is someone
at the age of 14 or 15 mature enough to comprehend the life and death
implications of a career track that might eventually lead to going to war?
I began to do research and quickly learned a number of
facts that I found personally disturbing, including the discovery that I was
wrong to think that military indoctrination in schools begins as young as 14
years old. Thanks to a program called the National Middle School Cadet Corps
(NMSCC), there are nearly 100 middle schools in this country that allow
indoctrination to begin at the age of 11, or younger if the student has an
older sibling already in the program.[1] The majority of these
middle school programs are located in the states of Florida, Georgia, Kansas,
Texas.
Here’s some more information about JROTC:
1) There
are roughly 3,000 JROTC units in high schools in the United States. These units
represent all branches of the military.
2) Most
schools that offer JROTC allow students to substitute it for their physical
education classes. Furthermore, here’s a National Institute of Health article[2] that found that
participants in JROTC were required to do significantly less physical activity
than those in a typical high school PE class.
3) In
any given year, somewhere between 30% and 50% of JROTC enrollees enlist in the
armed services after high school.
4) The
JROTC and the National Rifle Association (NRA) enjoy a cozy relationship. While
weapons training is not allowed in most schools, JROTC units frequently receive
NRA grants for air rifles, spotting scopes, and pellets. In addition, JROTC members are encouraged to
participate in NRA shooting matches. (Air rifles have come a long way from the
BB guns we shot as kids. Today’s air rifles are often designed to look very
similar to the various models of M16s currently in use in the military).
Here’s something else I learned: According to
Wikipedia, “In May 2008, the American Civil Liberties Union stated that JROTC
violates the United Nations sponsored Convention on the Rights of the Child by
targeting students as young as 14 for recruitment to the military.[3] The United States has not ratified the
Convention, although it has ratified an optional protocol to the Convention on
"the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed
Conflict." [4]
In other words, while supporting a ban on the use of
child soldiers elsewhere in the world, the United States has opted to allow for
their training here. How? By insisting
that recruitment for the military is not an official goal of JROTC. (Despite,
as I mentioned before, that fact that somewhere between 30% and 50% of JROTC
members will enlist). That rate is many times higher than the average
enlistment rate of high school graduates of roughly 5%.
JROTC is one of several issues that my new novel for
teens, Price of Duty, confronts. In it, Jake Liddell is a 19-year-old heroic
wounded warrior who’s just returned from America’s Forever War in the Middle
East – as of this writing, now more than 17 years and running. Thanks to his bravery,
Jake is being considered for the Silver Star for valor in combat. A graduate of
his high school’s JROTC, he is a hero to his military family and his town.
In many ways, Jake’s high school experience mirrored
that of many young people in JROTC today. He believed in his country, right or
wrong. He was dazzled by the military’s media campaign (in TV advertisements
and on social media) promoting strength, teamwork, and valor. He was aware that
the military offers lucrative signing bonuses (up to $40,000) to enlistees.
And, as in many high schools around the country, he was tempted to enlist by
the recruitment officers who showed up at his school on a weekly basis.
Despite the protests of his family, Jake enlisted immediately
after high school. But like so many in his position, his experience in the
military was not what he’d imagined. Nothing had prepared him for the reality
of war – the horror, the death (not just of soldiers, but of civilians,
children included), the mutilation, the psychological toll, the terror. Now
he’s returned home, torn between the pressure to be the hero everyone thinks he
is, and the shaken, wounded witness to a devastation few outside opf soldiers in
combat have known.
In my mind, a school should be a place for education,
not militarization. Yes, we do need a military in this country, but I don’t
believe that military education should be an option available in schools. At
least, not in public schools. When military education is available in schools,
and presented as an easy and lucrative option, it can be a temptation.
One thing I remember about middle school and high
school was the number of students who disliked PE because they didn’t enjoy the
exercise and it left them sweaty. In addition, at that sensitive and insecure
time of life, it meant undressing in locker rooms and showering with other
students. I don’t know how many young
people would have opted for JROTC, had it existed in my school, just to get out
of the exercise, sweating and showering. But I suspect some would have for that
reason alone.
I also remember being 11 or 12 and playing Army with
my friends, using sticks as pretend rifles. We would shoot each other, fall
down and “die,” and then get right back up and continue playing. At the age of
12, or 14, or even 16, are young people really prepared to make a decision that
will put them on a track that will eventually lead to military service?
While the exact number of students in JROTC programs
varies from year to year, it is estimated that at any given time more than half
a million young people are enrolled. A significant number of these young people
will eventually join the military. Some will go to war. Some will die.
[1] http://www.nationalmiddleschoolcadetcorps.com/Home_Page.html
[2] JROTC
as a Substitute for PE: Really? (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4285375/)
[3] "Soldiers
of Misfortune" (PDF). American Civil Liberties Union. 2008.
[4] "11.b
Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the
Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict". United Nations Treaty
Collection. May 25, 2000. Retrieved August 28, 2013.
