Mission Bay HS school students face increased militarization]

[Rich Gibson <rgibson@pipeline.com>]

Forwarding from Project Yano (below)

One argument not made here....at the heart of education is the 
struggle for what is true. The US military, and every national 
military, has only contradiction in common with the struggle for the 
truth. "All warfare is based on deception." (Sun Tzu)

Moreover, one does not have to go back a few thousand years, to 
ancient China, to demonstrate that the US military is operates on a 
fuel of lies, ie, Vietnam to today.

There are problems with the local control case made below, as well. 
Would it be ok if, say, a locally controlled chose to operate JROTC, 
or, in a similar vein, to segregate itself (as most do now)?










> We thought you would want to know that a decision is about to be 
> made that could result in the further militarization of students in 
> the San Diego Unified School District. This would be done through 
> the establishment of a Marine Corps JROTC unit at Mission Bay High 
> School. Only three high schools in the district, including MBHS, 
> currently remain free of JROTC.
>
> The school district's proposed budget will be up for a vote by the 
> school board on July 23. It contains $64,000 to establish MCJROTC at 
> MBHS. At least one school board member is committed to voting 
> against it. Historically, it has always been much easier to keep 
> JROTC out of a school than to remove it once it's installed.
>
> There are several arguments that might succeed in persuading a board 
> majority to reject JROTC at MBHS:
>
> 1. The community was not consulted. Apparently, the Mission Bay 
> principal, Cheryl Seelos, proposed JROTC to her site council and 
> they went along. It's doubtful they were fully informed about the 
> curriculum or what the full financial cost would be because usually 
> only positive reasons are presented by its proponents when JROTC is 
> proposed at a school. According to the school board member who 
> represents the district that includes MBHS, John de Beck, the larger 
> community there has not been notified or asked for input, and even 
> the school board member himself was not consulted before the 
> proposed budget was drawn up.
>
> 2. It will subsidize military training at the expense of other 
> programs and services. The standard agreement schools must sign for 
> JROTC obligates the school to hire two retired military officers to 
> teach 100-150 students, with the federal government contributing 
> less than half of the total staffing cost. We don't have the exact 
> financial details for MBHS, but the net expense to the school is 
> almost always much greater than the cost of keeping students in P.E. 
> classes (JROTC is offered to students as a substitute for P.E.). At 
> a minimum, an exact accounting of all the potential costs to the 
> district should be prepared and compared to the cost for keeping 
> 100-150 students in P.E.
>
> 3. The district will be adopting the wrong priorities for MBHS 
> students. At the same time that money is being requested for MCJROTC 
> at Mission Bay, the proposed district budget would cut an academic 
> assistance program for students in MBHS feeder schools that prepares 
> them for the International Baccalaureate program at the high school. 
> Thus, these budget priorities will favor military careers for 
> students over academic opportunity, a historical pattern where 
> student bodies are mostly nonwhite. Students of color are 75% of the 
> student body at MBHS. Half of the students are Latinos who are 
> currently being aggressively targeted with special recruitment 
> programs by the military.
>
> 4. There has been no curriculum review. MCJROTC is a new program in 
> this district and should not be adopted before there is an adequate 
> opportunity for parents, school board members and others to examine 
> and analyze the curriculum, including the textbooks. A review of the 
> Air Force JROTC curriculum done by the district in 1094 uncovered 
> numerous objectionable aspects of the textbooks, including 
> inaccuracies, distortions, one-sidedness and, in some materials, a 
> "lack of sensitivity to ethnic groups, women and religion."
>
> Additional points that can be made:
>
> - JROTC does not have a monopoly on teaching leadership education 
> and self-discipline, it can be taught in electives like music and 
> sports, and in academic programs like AVID and International Baccalaureate.
>
> - JROTC teachers are not even required to have a college degree, let 
> alone a degree in education. They are also not required to pass the 
> CBEST, a test that every other California teacher must pass for a credential.
>
> - Many of the JROTC classes include teaching students marksmanship 
> using air rifles and firing ranges inside schools. Weapons training 
> is the opposite of what our schools should be doing.
>
> - The U.S. Congress has stated that JROTC is the military's best 
> recruiting program. Schools should not be involved in grooming 
> students to be recruited.
>
> The budget meeting will be at the school district headquarters on 
> July 23. For details on the agenda, call 619-725-5550. Since it is a 
> budget workshop, it is not known yet whether public testimony will 
> be permitted at this meeting.
>
> As soon as possible, residents in the school district should contact 
> the SDUSD board and express their views about the proposal to 
> introduce Marine Corps JROTC at MBHS. Email 
> <mailto:board@sandi.net>board@sandi.net (please CC: 
> <mailto:projyano@aol.com>projyano@aol.com). Board members are:
>
> Luis Acle, President
> Shelia Jackson, Vice President
> John de Beck, Member
> Mitz Lee, Member
> Katherine Nakamura, Member
>
> For more general information on the issue, visit our Web site, 
> <http://www.projectyano.org>www.projectyano.org, as well as 
> <http://www.nnomy.org/>www.nnomy.org/.
>
> Project on Youth and Non-Military Opportunities
> 760-634-3604
> <http://www.projectyano.org/>http://www.projectyano.org/
>
>
>
>
> ----------
> See what's free at <http://www.aol.com?ncid=AOLAOF00020000000503>AOL.com.
> _______________________________________________
> sdcpj mailing list
> sdcpj@lists.quantumimagery.com
> http://lists.quantumimagery.com/listinfo.cgi/sdcpj-quantumimagery.com