Happy As Kings

Give it back

A thought just occured to me about pushing to get homeschooled grads the military enlistment Tier I status 'just because,'  and despite the survey that showed them to have a higher attrition rate than grads who attended mass-education schools.  (my choice of action is to give them the tools to attain Tier I status, not just say that being Tier II is "discrimination")

If the kids aren't prepared for service life and, through no bad actions of their own still don't complete the enlistment -- but have received a signing bonus, they'll have to give it back.  With the government, you always have to give it back if, for whatever reason, the terms of the contract were not fulfilled.  Ask any servicemember who was paid something he or she wasn't 'authorized' even if, after being asked repeatedly, Finance swears on a stack of regulations that it is authorized.  (in that case, put the money in a bank account and leave it alone until they come asking for it -- which they always do)

No completion of service = no bonus.

• LEGAL INFORMATION CHECKLIST FOR PLAN OF THE DAY NOTES
  
  c.  Other Than Honorable (OTH): A characterization of other than honorable is appropriate when the reason for separation is based upon one or more acts that constitute a significant departure from the conduct expected from members of the naval service.  Persons given an OTH discharge are not entitled to retain their uniforms, must accept transportation in kind to their homes, are subject to recoupment of any reenlistment bonus they may have received, and do not receive mileage fees from the place of discharge to their home of record.  Additionally, the Veterans Administration will make its own determination whether the discharge was under conditions other than honorable.  This characterization is authorized only if the service member has been afforded the opportunity to request an Administrative Board, except as provide by Separation in Lieu of Trial by Court-Martial.

Giving unprepared people priority Tier I status does them no favors.  "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," especially when it's someone else's life you're talking about.

Federal legislation needed?

One of the reasons cited for the need for federal legislation to allow homeschooled grads to be Tier I enlistees in the military services, is that 'the military' is a federal entity.  I've already suggested that, to avoid the need for making homeschooling a specially-treated category in federal law concerning military enlistment, the families be aware of what is needed to gain Tier I status:

• 15 college credit hours (1 full-time semester)
• do senior year of high school at a brick&mortar school

In addition to this, it seems that membership in JROTC has an excellent track record in helping first-termers complete that first hitch, as well as making them feel comfortable enough in their jobs to re-enlist.  JROTC by itself isn't a Tier I qualifier, but from a parental and individual point of view, it looks like a winner.

My point isn't to 'help homeschoolers' as a category, but rather to help the kids make a good choice and to be prepared for the life that follows making that choice.  That's a win for everyone.

In reading the HR 3753/S 1691 blog, I've found another avenue: enlisting in the Reserves.

• Concerned Citizens asks, "Why would HSLDA wish to pass Federal Law for misunderstandings that could be better handled by individuals within their states and cities on a case by case basis?"
  For the military issue, there really is no way to resolve matters on a state-by-state basis. The United States military is truly a federal entity.
  For what it's worth, we aren't having these kinds of problems with the National Guard, by and large. We've had some great homeschool successes in those State entities.
  
  (it's the comment at the bottom of the screen)

Well, there ya go.  Another way to enlist without making homeschoolers a stand-alone group concerning federal enlistment law.

Those picky military services

In an entry at the HR3753 blog, the comment is made that although the Navy won't accept a homeschooled candidate as Tier I, the Army will, and that this is unfair because the candidate wants to join the Navy, not the Army. The implication is that because of the unfairness, federal legislation is needed to correct the disparity.

My dad could have used help like that in 1935. That was the year he graduated from high school and tried to enlist in the Navy, but got turned down. And why? Because during his physical, the doctor put a tongue depressor in his mouth and told him to bite down on it. The tongue depressor's 'outside end' didn't remain level, but went up because my dad had a slight underbite. The Navy doctor shook his head, and said it was too bad, and rated my dad as unsuitable for enlisting in the Navy. Dad then went next door to the Army recruiter, was accepted without the tongue depressor test, and was off to the first assignment of a 30-year Army/Air Force career.

Dad said that if he'd only known what they were looking for, he'd have made sure to bite evenly on the tongue depressor. (I'm glad he didn't know that because then he'd have been in a ship floating on an ocean and never met my then-Army-Mom at Scott Field-in-the-middle-of-the-continent, and where would that have left little twinkle-in-the-eye me?)

(me and dad in 1968 -- see the underbite?)

It's unfortunate that the young candidate in the anecdote at the HR 3753 blog didn't know beforehand what the Navy would be looking for. I suppose if he gets those 15 credit hours of college to qualify for Tier I status, the Navy recruiters will be glad to talk to him, but that's cold comfort unless the young man sees the additional preparation as a benefit to himself, helpful preparation for his first military hitch, and possibly the beginning of a career.

Preparation is the key to making sure your tongue depressor doesn't 'pop up.'

What we can do for homeschooling families who are looking at the military for their kids, is not to put homeschool-qualifiers in federal law, but rather educate them. The information as to what the services are looking for in terms of Tier I recruits applies to everyone, and can be distributed without wrinkling the fabric of federal law. In this way the families and potential-servicemembers can be prepared to present to bureaucratic-thinkers a bureaucrat-friendly record that will be easily understood and accepted. This is in line with the aphorism that, "you can have anything you want, but you can't have everything you want."

HR 3753/S 1691: federalization of hmschl page

(drat the copied formatting -- this won't go over to the left.  anyhow, this is what will be on the current Federalization of Homeschooling page.  It isn't up yet because publishing a site in fits and starts is ... not as useful as I'd like and leaves unlinked pages 'twisting in the wind.'  Blogs, though !! [insert happy face]  Blogs get to be as fractured as they like.

Later on I'll be working on the fisking of Section 10 to be published at the web site.  In the meantime, you can mull this over.)

Oh, and email or fax your legislators about this.

2005 Events

HR 3753/SB 1691

History

In September of 2005, events from July 2003 replayed themselves with Rep. Marilyn Musgrave of Colorado introducing into the House of Representatives a bill titled "Home School Non-Discrimination Act," humanizingly given the acronym of HONDA.  This was an omnibus bill that was killed in committee in 2003.  In its resurrected form it is much the same, but with the inclusion of a new section "Recruitment and Enlistment of Home-schooled Students in the Armed Forces."  The new section is nonsense.

Why homeschooled grads are classified as Tier II recruits

Homeschooled graduates are already able to enlist in the armed forces, but they are not traditionally granted the same categorization as publicly and privately schooled graduates.  Studies have shown that recruits with non-traditional diplomas do not have the same success rate as recruits with public- or private-school  diplomas.  It's the one area where public-schooling is superior to homeschooling. 

At the urging of HSLDA, a five-year study was commissioned to determine the enlistment track record of homeschooled graduates.  The determining factor of 'success' was completion of the first hitch.  Unfortunately, homeschool grads did not have as good a record of 'success' (in context of completing that first hitch) as do publicly-schooled grads.  The Tier II label was not discriminatory, merely descriptive.

Why pacifists should care (answer: because they're taxpayers)

The phenomenon of public-schooling as the best predictor of success in the military was determined through studies conducted since 1959, and a tier-system was put in place to ensure that the nation's military services accept and pay to train the people with the greatest chance of making full use of that training by completing a first-term enlistment and possibly re-enlisting.   This makes the best use of the taxpayers' money, whether those taxpayers have any intention of supporting the military system or not.  I assume that even people who do not support many military operations want those operations to be carried out as inexpensively as possible until the day that peace prevails.

What procedure does DoD see as producing a "High School Graduate?"

Homeschooled graduates are not 'second-class citizens' but only people who, if the military is their target, need the tools to realize their dreams.  Unfortunately this begins early because the military's definition of 'High School Graduate' is 12 years of graded instruction.  The 'grading' is doubly defined because it refers to 'taught subjects' that are graded by the instructor, and that the children progressed from First Grade on up to Twelfth Grade.  For school-at-home families, this won't be as much of a problem as it will be for eclectic  or unschooling families.

How can homeschooled grads acquire Tier I status, with the intention of increasing their chances of enlistment 'success?'

For families who did not use a school-at-home program for all twelve grades, the work-around for the potential recruit is to acquire 15 college credit hours, the equivalent of being a full-time college student for one semester.

Fisking Section 10

Section 10 of HR 3753/S 1691 is longer than the sections from the 2003 version of the bills.  Section 10 is longer because it would create a new section of public law: Title 10, Chapter 31, a portion that controls military enlistment.  Because of the length, I've used up another portion of my 5MB of member-space on the freebie site of my ISP's server with a separate page for the 'fisking' (a blogger term meaning to examine a piece of writing column inch-by-column inch).

To use blogger style:  the fisking is here.  [blog note: that's what I'm working on right now -- or will be after I get back home today]

HR 3753/S 1691 at The Military Homeschooler

I'm working on updating my website, but the writing is taking longer than I thought because Section 10 of the bills is completely new this time around (most of the homeschool 'nondiscrimination' bill was introduced in 2003 and mercifully killed; the military section is new)

Still, the thinking ought to be thrown 'out there' asap.  So here's what I've got so far:

It's not up yet, but this is what I've got for the front page :

Possible federalization of homeschooling

HR 3753/S 1691  Home-school NonDiscrimination Act of 2005

In 2003 the first version of the legislative bill titled the Home-school NonDiscrimination Act was introduced to Congress.  It died in committee.  This one should die faster since the 2005 version contains a new section, number 10, which, in the context of Vietnam-era GI-speak, should tell you something.  (search for 'number ten' using Ctrl+F)

Section 10 of HR 3753/S 1691 would create a new section of public law concerning enlistment only of homeschooled kids.  No other group of potential recruits has such a section.  The possibilities for precedent, may be unprecedented in terms of federal attention to homeschooling families.  In combination with the other sections, recycled without noticeable change from 2003, homeschooling parents who are concerned about regulation of homeschooling should homeschool themselves about the effects of the bills.

The linked page has information about objections to the 2003 version, not much which will have changed in two years.  A 'fisking' (to use blog-speak), of the new 'number 10' military section is added.