Militarization of Chicago Public Schools: Part II

In the first installment, I said this would be a series, which put an obligation on me to write, at minimum, a Part II. So here it is. If you read this and wonder what it has to do with the Chicago Public Schools -- that'll come in a future installment (if I get around to it!).

Part II: Recruitment Fraud

In Part I, I described how NCLB gives the military greater access to public school students. But so what? So what if the Navy recruiter wanders the halls of your neighborhood high school? He's not forcing anyone to sign up. Right?

But he can't be relied upon as an impartial source of information -- not with the quotas he needs to fill. Here are some things the recruiter won't mention:

* There is no conclusive evidence that military service improves employment prospects. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has done a study that shows that unemployment rates are lower for some demographic groups, but higher for others.

* Need money for college? The military won't just give it to you -- you have to pay into the GI Bill program first, and even then, there are circumstances that may disqualify you (in which case they get to keep what you paid in). There are other sources of assistance that may be better and come with fewer strings attached.

* The recruiting agreement is a one-way agreement that is binding on the student, but not on the military. So the military is not bound to make good on any of the promises made at the time of enlistment. (Exhibit A: The backdoor draft.)

Let it be known that I'm not against the military per se. But I am against young men and women being recruited on false pretenses. This past week the Chicago Tribune reported that recruiters are failing to meet quotas -- by a wide margin. This is a result of both increased recruitment goals and lower numbers of recruits. On the one hand, I can speculate that this may be the result of fewer kids falling prey to deceptive tactics; on the other hand, the shortfall may spur the military to recruit kids more aggressively and with less honesty.