CommunityEditor
02-14-2009, 05:54 PM
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Wilder Lee always advised his students against joining the Marine Corps.
“They’re just moving targets,” the Memphis high school teacher said as he waited to board an airplane that would take him to see the “targets” up close at Parris Island, S.C., the Corps’ East Coast training facility.
Lee was among about 80 people invited on an all-expenses-paid, four-day trip to Parris Island in January as part of the Marine Corps’ Educators’ Workshop program. The program runs weekly from January through May, rotating through educators from different geographic districts across the country. Lee’s group represented schools under the Nashville and Montgomery, Ala., recruiting stations.
Recruiters specifically chose Lee and others with similar opinions about the Marine Corps in an effort to show them some stereotypes about Marines aren’t accurate.
In a culture where knowledge of the Marine Corps is encapsulated in the 1987 film “Full Metal Jacket” — with boot camp scenes framed by profanity and violence — the Marines hope to get the message across that they don’t brutalize recruits.
Recruit training no longer allows drill instructors to curse at or touch their charges. But few outsiders realize that, according to Maj. Kathy Lee-Wood, executive officer of the female training battalion on base and one of the workshop leaders.
“You hear all of the bad stories,” Lee-Wood told workshop participants at their welcome dinner. “What you don’t hear are all of the good stories.”
Marine Corps pride is strong within the ranks, but historically, other branches of the service — and many civilians — have come to see Marines in a somewhat negative light, said Bumper Reese, a Red Bank High School teacher and coach who attended the Educators’ Workshop six years ago.
“Most people think the Marine Corps is just brash, raw. The dummies of the service. Other branches have names for them, like ‘bullet stoppers’ and things like that,” said Reese, whose father was a Marine. “But they’re intelligent.”
It is true that the Corps is “a very infantry-centric organization,” said Lt. Col. Katherine Estes, commanding officer of Parris Island’s Support Battalion.
Marines are “riflemen first,” agreed Brig. Gen. James Laster, commander of recruit training for the eastern United States. At the same time, he said, “We’re not all about killing people. The president may call on us to do that, but really, on a day-to-day basis, our mission is to lead and mentor young people.”
The Marine Corps doesn’t want to be seen a last resort for troubled youth, said Maj. Marty Steimle, operations branch head at Parris Island. It wants to attract talented and intelligent individuals just like other branches such as the Air Force, which advertises highly technical jobs that translate well to the civilian work force, he said.
“There’s this stigma: You either go to jail or you go into the Marine Corps,” Steimle said. “We want to show the educators that this is a legitimate opportunity for top students.”
The Marines are attracting high-quality recruits, boasted Laster, noting that 95 percent of recruits are high school graduates and 63 percent score in the top three categories on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery test.
Workshop organizers introduced participants to a number of Marines whose jobs weren’t on the front lines. They also presented a panel to address the educational and apprenticeship opportunities Marines can tackle — while on active duty and afterward through the GI Bill.
They also confronted the much-publicized issue of enlistment waivers for felony convictions. Enlistment standards are high, and recruiters don’t want to see drug use, medical problems or excessive tattoos, according to Maj. William Sauerland, commanding officer of the Montgomery, Ala., recruiting station.
With drug use, he said, “we look at the whole individual, because if they just used drugs maybe once or twice, they can probably get a waiver.”
Other felonies also can be eligible for waivers, he said, though recruiters weigh the severity and frequency of any criminal offenses before approving waivers.
Part of the Corps’ image overhaul involves breaking stereotypes about the automaton qualities of the Marines and their often-caricatured drill instructors.
“We want you to realize that they’re not some machine,” said Col. Jeffery Peterson, chief of staff of the Eastern Recruiting Region. When you cut them, they bleed. When their mother passes away, they cry. They are real people.”
Staff Sgt. Carlos Enriquez was the Tennessee educator group’s drill instructor throughout the week, yelling as he would to recruits when appropriate but breaking from character periodically to rib his charges playfully about their lack of marching skills or describe his role as a father figure to new recruits.
The drill instructors’ demeanor with educators doesn’t exactly reflect basic training, said Arlene Inouye, a speech therapist in Los Angeles who attended the workshop in San Diego in 2005.
“They put us up in a high-class hotel, they gave us free time and they allowed us to ask all the questions we wanted,” said Inouye, who founded the Coalition Against Militarism in Our Schools in 2003. “That’s totally different from what a real recruit would go through.”
Lee also questioned the motives of his hosts, even after returning home from the trip.
“I still believe they’re training to be moving targets,” he said in a telephone interview. “I understand what they do better now, so I’m going to tell some of my kids about it, but only the type of kids who have the fortitude for it.”
That’s all the Marines can hope for, said Maj. David Banning, commanding officer of the Nashville Recruiting Station.
Although the Marine Corps is currently ahead of its recruiting goals, the competition to keep it that way is fierce.
“We’re in competition with every other company, with every other business, for the best and the brightest,” he said.
Article: http://www.militarytimes.com/news/2009/02/ap_marines_selling_teachers_021409/
“They’re just moving targets,” the Memphis high school teacher said as he waited to board an airplane that would take him to see the “targets” up close at Parris Island, S.C., the Corps’ East Coast training facility.
Lee was among about 80 people invited on an all-expenses-paid, four-day trip to Parris Island in January as part of the Marine Corps’ Educators’ Workshop program. The program runs weekly from January through May, rotating through educators from different geographic districts across the country. Lee’s group represented schools under the Nashville and Montgomery, Ala., recruiting stations.
Recruiters specifically chose Lee and others with similar opinions about the Marine Corps in an effort to show them some stereotypes about Marines aren’t accurate.
In a culture where knowledge of the Marine Corps is encapsulated in the 1987 film “Full Metal Jacket” — with boot camp scenes framed by profanity and violence — the Marines hope to get the message across that they don’t brutalize recruits.
Recruit training no longer allows drill instructors to curse at or touch their charges. But few outsiders realize that, according to Maj. Kathy Lee-Wood, executive officer of the female training battalion on base and one of the workshop leaders.
“You hear all of the bad stories,” Lee-Wood told workshop participants at their welcome dinner. “What you don’t hear are all of the good stories.”
Marine Corps pride is strong within the ranks, but historically, other branches of the service — and many civilians — have come to see Marines in a somewhat negative light, said Bumper Reese, a Red Bank High School teacher and coach who attended the Educators’ Workshop six years ago.
“Most people think the Marine Corps is just brash, raw. The dummies of the service. Other branches have names for them, like ‘bullet stoppers’ and things like that,” said Reese, whose father was a Marine. “But they’re intelligent.”
It is true that the Corps is “a very infantry-centric organization,” said Lt. Col. Katherine Estes, commanding officer of Parris Island’s Support Battalion.
Marines are “riflemen first,” agreed Brig. Gen. James Laster, commander of recruit training for the eastern United States. At the same time, he said, “We’re not all about killing people. The president may call on us to do that, but really, on a day-to-day basis, our mission is to lead and mentor young people.”
The Marine Corps doesn’t want to be seen a last resort for troubled youth, said Maj. Marty Steimle, operations branch head at Parris Island. It wants to attract talented and intelligent individuals just like other branches such as the Air Force, which advertises highly technical jobs that translate well to the civilian work force, he said.
“There’s this stigma: You either go to jail or you go into the Marine Corps,” Steimle said. “We want to show the educators that this is a legitimate opportunity for top students.”
The Marines are attracting high-quality recruits, boasted Laster, noting that 95 percent of recruits are high school graduates and 63 percent score in the top three categories on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery test.
Workshop organizers introduced participants to a number of Marines whose jobs weren’t on the front lines. They also presented a panel to address the educational and apprenticeship opportunities Marines can tackle — while on active duty and afterward through the GI Bill.
They also confronted the much-publicized issue of enlistment waivers for felony convictions. Enlistment standards are high, and recruiters don’t want to see drug use, medical problems or excessive tattoos, according to Maj. William Sauerland, commanding officer of the Montgomery, Ala., recruiting station.
With drug use, he said, “we look at the whole individual, because if they just used drugs maybe once or twice, they can probably get a waiver.”
Other felonies also can be eligible for waivers, he said, though recruiters weigh the severity and frequency of any criminal offenses before approving waivers.
Part of the Corps’ image overhaul involves breaking stereotypes about the automaton qualities of the Marines and their often-caricatured drill instructors.
“We want you to realize that they’re not some machine,” said Col. Jeffery Peterson, chief of staff of the Eastern Recruiting Region. When you cut them, they bleed. When their mother passes away, they cry. They are real people.”
Staff Sgt. Carlos Enriquez was the Tennessee educator group’s drill instructor throughout the week, yelling as he would to recruits when appropriate but breaking from character periodically to rib his charges playfully about their lack of marching skills or describe his role as a father figure to new recruits.
The drill instructors’ demeanor with educators doesn’t exactly reflect basic training, said Arlene Inouye, a speech therapist in Los Angeles who attended the workshop in San Diego in 2005.
“They put us up in a high-class hotel, they gave us free time and they allowed us to ask all the questions we wanted,” said Inouye, who founded the Coalition Against Militarism in Our Schools in 2003. “That’s totally different from what a real recruit would go through.”
Lee also questioned the motives of his hosts, even after returning home from the trip.
“I still believe they’re training to be moving targets,” he said in a telephone interview. “I understand what they do better now, so I’m going to tell some of my kids about it, but only the type of kids who have the fortitude for it.”
That’s all the Marines can hope for, said Maj. David Banning, commanding officer of the Nashville Recruiting Station.
Although the Marine Corps is currently ahead of its recruiting goals, the competition to keep it that way is fierce.
“We’re in competition with every other company, with every other business, for the best and the brightest,” he said.
Article: http://www.militarytimes.com/news/2009/02/ap_marines_selling_teachers_021409/