At Last, Some Campus Sanity: ROTC Gains The renaissance of the Reserve Officer Training Corps at leading universities picked up steam in 2015. By Jonathan E. Hillman And Cheryl Miller
http://www.wsj.com/articles/at-last-some-campus-sanity-rotc-gains-1451430342
In a year marred by campus strife, at least one bright spot emerged in American higher education: the comeback of the Reserve Officer Training Corps, known as ROTC, at leading universities.
This year, Columbia University commissioned its first Marine officer, Patrick Poorbaugh, since 1970. Yale graduated two Naval ROTC officers— Sam Cohen and Andrew Heymann—for the first time since Richard Nixon was in the White House. Yale, with 41 midshipmen, boasts the largest NROTC unit in the Ivy League. Harvard senior Charlotte Falletta was recognized as one of the top 10 Army cadets in the nation.
Even Brown University, the last Ivy League school to move beyond the Vietnam-era politics that yanked ROTC programs from campus, is changing. In 2012 Brown established a center for students interested in military careers, and this year the school signed deals allowing students to participate in Naval and Air Force ROTC programs off campus.
Stemming from the repeal of the military’s sexual-orientation policy “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” five years ago, these gains suggest that a genuine resurgence is under way. But to ensure that tomorrow’s military is representative of the nation it protects, further engagement is needed from both university and military leaders.
There are plenty of opportunities to improve recruitment efforts. Cornell, MIT and other universities allow prospective students to indicate their interest in the military on their application and pursue ROTC scholarships. Once admitted, interested students receive more information and guidance from ROTC staff. More institutions should adopt this practice.
After students arrive on campus, faculty involvement is indispensable. For decades, faculty support for ROTC was limited to a courageous few, such as Columbia sociologist Allan Silver, who died this year. Now others must pick up that work, and a good start would be granting academic credit for more ROTC courses.
Cornell offers one model, awarding partial credit for introductory courses and full credit for more advanced seminars. Faculty should also consider designing courses that meet both ROTC and university standards, such as Professor Paul Kennedy’s popular military history course at Yale.
This engagement is even more important as the military continues its planned drawdown. To its credit, the Defense Department has embraced the importance of geographic diversity in maintaining a truly national officer corps by resisting calls to close ROTC units that field fewer than 15 officers a year. If that proposal became policy today, even Yale’s NROTC program might be cut short. Thankfully, Gen. David G. Perkins, who oversees Army ROTC nationwide, said earlier this year that “ROTC is going to have to get smaller,” but not by “giving up certain parts of the country.”
Ultimately, students will decide whether the ROTC renaissance continues. As former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates told an audience at Duke University five years ago: “A return of ROTC back to some of these campuses will not do much good without the willingness of our nation’s most gifted students to step forward.” But if this year’s talented graduates are any indication, many more young Americans will answer that call.
Mr. Hillman is the chairman of Brown Alumni for ROTC. Ms. Miller is a freelance writer in Washington, D.C.
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