Given the longstanding military tradition in San Diego, it’s common to see college students in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) programs drilling and training on football fields of local universities. And many high schools in the San Diego Unified School District ” including Point Loma High ” have a Junior ROTC program aimed at instilling citizenship values in high school students entering the real world.
After Mission Bay High School (MBHS) started a Marine Corps Junior ROTC in the fall of 2007, it drew protests from Project on Youth and Non-Military Opportunities (Project YANO), an organization that promotes non-military opportunities for high school students.
The commotion started after a request for $65,000 to fund the Mission Bay program was made public last year, according to a statement from Project YANO.
Project YANO’s Rich Jankow said the program acts as a military recruiting tool.
“Evidence suggests a districtwide pattern of students being tracked into [Junior ROTC]. It’s a violation of the state education code,” he said.
The students, many of them Latino, are given the impression that the best choice for them is to join ROTC or serving in the military, he said.
However, Lt. Col. Jan Janus, manager for the districtwide program, said the Junior ROTC does not recruit students for the military.
He said the program’s mission centers on improving citizenship responsibilities of approximately 2,000 cadets throughout the district. MBHS has about 100 students enrolled in the program, he said.
“Our concern as instructors is to make sure that our young people are good citizens, set some goals and are successful in those goals, whether it’s in college or someplace else,” he said.
It doesn’t benefit the military, or anybody, to recruit the reluctant, Janus said, and if they want to serve after high school “that’s their choice.”
A single Junior ROTC elective class doesn’t count for college credit, but three or more years in the high school program earn a year’s credit for the college-level ROTC, Janus said.
As the program emphasizes civic responsibility, patriotism and health education, it also includes traditional military exercises like drilling and air rifle training for national competition.
Air rifle ranges in city schools including Lincoln High, Point Loma High School and now Mission Bay lead some to believe that the Junior ROTC is really a military training program that violates “zero-tolerance” policies by having weapons on campus, Jankow said.
Janus points outs that air rifle marksmanship is an Olympic sport and San Diego High has even done well in competition.
The students practice in a relatively safe environment and can’t touch the .22-caliber air rifles without the supervision of instructors such as Capt. Tom Cunningham and 1st Sgt. Jack Patague. They administer the Point Loma High Navy Junior ROTC. Cunningham said his program emphasizes four concepts.
“Safety comes first. A participative environment, continuous [individual] improvement and teamwork,” Cunningham said.
“We’re trying to build self-confidence. We’re trying to build leaders,” he added.
Students in the program also need their parents’ permission, and when finished, the guns are locked up and inaccessible, he said.
Using the rifles is well within the law with the principal’s permission. And MBHS principal Cheryl Seelos said she’s glad she brought the program on board because it helps build leadership skills. She said she considered the program after students asked for it, adding that students aren’t tracked into the elective.
Seelos fast-tracked the program after becoming principal about two years ago and allocated special funding for the program.
This is partly the reason those who oppose the program dislike it.
“[Junior ROTC] is given privileged treatment, space and staffing resources when other programs are defunded and denied to the students,” Jankow said.
Project YANO and other anti-war organizers plan to continue protesting the school district over the Junior ROTC, Jankow said.
The Junior ROTC began in 1916 by an act of Congress and was greatly expanded in 1964. The San Diego Unified School District has had Junior ROTC since 1919. San Diego High was the first to get it in 1919, and the program started at Hoover high school in 1930, according to Janus.