COUNTERING MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Articles: Military Recruiting: Student Privacy
Tempe board lets teens ditch military recruiters, not colleges
Andrea Falkenhagen, East Valley Tribune
June 14, 2007
Kay Grams doesn't want her 16-year-old daughter's name going into a
military recruitment database.
So last year, when the Tempe mother enrolled her daughter at
McClintock High School, she was told she could ask the school to
withhold her contact information from a list it gives the armed
forces but with a catch.
"I was told that by selecting that option, her name would also not be
included on a list that goes out to colleges, a list for
scholarships, even something with the yearbook," Grams said.
But two weeks ago, the Tempe Union High School District governing
board decided to accommodate parents like Grams. It voted unanimously
to change a policy and allow teens to just "opt out" of the military
contact, but still have their directory information passed on to
colleges and universities.
Grams is pleased with the decision.
"It's just so wrong that the education of our children should be
linked to having their name given to the military," she said. "It
runs counter to what I would hope my daughter's education would be
... what I would want her to know about is how not to deal with your
problems militarily."
The federal No Child Left Behind Act, passed in 2001, requires public
schools to provide the military with the names, addresses and phone
numbers for every high school junior and senior, unless parents
choose to block the information.
Last year, some 20 parents asked the Tempe Union district to not
distribute their children's information, said Cecelia Johnson,
director of curriculum, instruction and assessment for the district.
Some other East Valley districts, such as the Apache Junction Unified
School District, still run their opt-out process as an all-or-nothing
choice parents must make.
Others, like the Mesa Unified School District, currently use a
process like the one adopted by Tempe Union.
Last year, however, the Mesa district made an effort to clarify the
information to parents about recruitment efforts.
"We had some parents call and say that they thought that information
ought to be made clearer at the beginning of the year, so we kind of
beefed it up," said general counsel Tom Pickrell. The district added
a separate page about the opt-out provision in the districtwide
student information packet.
In the Mesa district, 78 parents asked schools to withhold their
children's names from the military. Numbers varied greatly by school,
with 34 students at Dobson High School opting out, compared to just
three students at Westwood High School.
At Mesquite High School in the Gilbert Unified School District, 76
students opted out last year.
The opt-out provision is advertised differently from school to school.
Emma Burr, a senior at Tempe Union district's Mountain Pointe High
School in Ahwatukee Foothills, said she wasn't even aware of the fact
that she could avoid having her contact information given to
recruiters, who have contacted her by e-mail.
Burr, 17, opposes the war and said she would prefer that recruiters
not contact her and her peers.
"I don't understand what makes people think it's OK to be courting
kids. We're so young. We don't have any idea what we're doing with
our lives," she said.
"We're not even old enough to make the decision to drink.... A lot of
the people they talk to aren't old enough to make the decision to
vote. I think it's highly inappropriate. "
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