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NEWS & LETTERS, April - May 2007Stop military testingMemphis, Tenn.--The 2006-2007 campaign against military testing in Memphis high schools appears to have resulted in a marked reduction in the number of students taking the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB). For decades, the Memphis high schools in cooperation with the military recruiting command, has been administering ASVAB, which is given in about two-thirds of the high schools throughout the U.S. to students as young as 16. Army recruiters use ASVAB as a recruiting tool and to assess students' aptitudes for military jobs. It gives the military access to the student's name, address, phone number, gender, ethnicity or race, and even their Social Security number. Some schools require students to take the test. Parental permission is not required Beginning in September 2006, the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center requested the city school board examine ways to make ASVAB less likely to give away students' privacy. In January 2007, we introduced a resolution to require default use of the ASVAB Option 8, which allows students to take the test without their test results or private information being turned over to the military. Initially, the board commissioners responded favorably. One commissioner said she believed the board members were in favor and that there should be no problem in getting the resolution passed. But later, we learned that the Army's local ASVAB coordinator, Mr. J.B. Smiley, was lobbying the board members. On the day the resolution was to be voted, a dozen or more men in battle fatigues marched into the meeting room. Smiley announced that some had come from as far as 500 miles to attend. He warned that if the Option 8 resolution passed, students' access to military recruiters and opportunities would be greatly reduced. "There is no sustainable evidence that students who join the armed forces fare worse than students who attend traditional colleges," Smiley brazenly added in a written statement--as if attending college was on the same level as fighting a war in Iraq! The board postponed the vote. To date, the resolution to implement Option 8 remains on hold, although the district did set a policy prohibiting compulsory ASVAB testing. Furthermore, the district notified all school principals and eligible students that the ASVAB test was strictly voluntary. Students are now required to sign up for the test in advance and have to go to a single room to take the test rather than taking it in their normal home rooms as they used to. Head counts at two schools show that only five to ten percent of the eligible students have taken the ASVAB. If this is representative of the dozen or so schools taking the ASVAB this winter and spring, our campaign is a success. We failed to get what we asked for, but instead may have gotten something better. --Counter-recruitment activist |
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