A Day at School

Last week, I joined fellow Veterans For Peace in a counter recruiting presentation at a local high school. Unlike military recruiters who have full access to school facilities, students and student information, counter recruiters must be invited by students, parents or teachers. We spoke to five English classes in a Phoenix area high school. If nothing else, the day reminded me of how hard teachers work. I was exhausted at the end of the day.

The kids were overwhelmingly Hispanic with some white, black and native Americans. What I noticed mostly was that they were kids in all their varied styles and expressions. Their teacher gave us a list of questions she had requested from each class. The questions were at once naive, insightful and honest. The teacher did an excellent job of incorporating us into the curriculum. She provided her students with a triangle diagraming the elements of argument--emotion, logic, factual information–and asked them to identify how we used each and give examples. She also used the opportunity to introduce vocabulary that was unfamiliar in our presentations. I thought it was a creative use of the opportunity to teach.

Our presentation was pretty direct and graphic. We talked of war as killing and explained the moral and ethical dilemmas we faced in that situation. We also showed photographs of war, not to shock but to remind the students that war nothing like the sanitized version offered by the media. Dennis told about his first kill in Vietnam, about how difficult and mind-bending it was, about how he read the dead man’s letters revealed that the dead man was no different from himself. John asked the students if they are willing to kill another human being. None were. They said it is not right unless that other human being is actually presenting a deadly threat (my paraphrase of their answers). I spoke about the balance between one’s obligation to serve the country and the nation’s obligation to honor that sacrifice with meaning. All three of us told them why we believe they should be wary of recruiters and this war. Dennis emphasized the particular risk of assault and rape faced by women in the military. We did not get too many questions directly from the classes. Most of the students were reticent. The list of questions we had gave their names so we asked them about their questions and opened a dialogue that took some interesting turns.

A few students asked about the military’s focus on Hispanic recruits, especially after we described the new recruiting offices the US has opened in Mexico, Dominican Republic and the Philippines. Some were aware of the contradiction in a country that welcomes Mexicans as recruits but not as immigrants. They also asked why we have wars, for which our only answer is that nations and leaders fail in their dealings with each other. When we asked them if they knew why the US is fighting in Iraq, most were silent. The ones who spoke said “9-11" which gave us the opportunity to describe the very real disconnect between the Iraq war and that tragic event.

I was amazed at how little of the world these students seemed to know compared to my own knowledge at that same age. Of course, my 40 year old memories of high school probably give me more credit than was actually the case. I was more aware of Vietnam and world events at their age but I was also pretty advantaged compare to these students so the difference could easily be due to that. Their lack of awareness did not mask their intelligence or curiosity at all. I thought many showed a real ability to think, especially the ones who stuck around after class to ask more questions.

We explained how recruiters work and why. We offered information on how students can protect themselves from recruiters by either opting out of the federal requirement that the school share information, by learning about the military and what it offers or by taking a parent or a veteran with them if they are interested in a military career. We used to recommend the military as a possible career choice, provided that a recruit does in fact get the training and opportunities he or she signs up for. Recent changes in the recruiting contract eliminate any guarantees–a recruit may be trained in a skill they request but there is no guarantee that they will actually be assigned to work in that skill if the military needs them for other purposes (read: combat or combat support). These days we tell the kids to look elsewhere in contemplating ways to serve their nation.

For me the best part of the day was seeing a teacher who teaches her students to think. I cannot imagine a greater gift.

postscript

We received a very nice thank you note from the teacher and a stack of thank you’s from the students. I’m just starting to read them now and will post some of their comments later.