In Georgia, this isn't necessarily true. The highest funding per student will frequently be in urban areas with a high tax base and low scores, and the highest student achievement is frequently in suburban districts, who have nice per pupil funding but don't have more than the Atlanta districts. But another factor is that funding per student is pretty meaningless since districts just take their total spending and divide by the number of kids. There's a really good chance that the money isn't getting to the classroom.

However, I will agree that there are a lot of areas in which the same social conditions that drive revenues are also contributing to school performance, both on the high and low end. But you're, I think, looking at correlation not cause in terms of the funding making the kids successful.


I certainly don't want to see teachers attacked, and I've read some absolutely absurd statements anytime salaries and hours come up. But I also think that teachers should be held in high enough regard that they can be accountable and rewarded for professional performance on some level. And honestly, I think it's only that we work with kids that makes us seem more dedicated or caring. My experience is that most professionals are as dedicated and committed to their practice as most teachers.

I'll also note that the language of "similar degrees" is really tricky. What's a similar degree when you are talking about early childhood education?

I think people have a willingness to want to treat all degrees at a certain level as being equal in considering pay, but they aren't. A BA in engineering typically earns one more than a degree in English or fashion merchandising. Where should an early childhood degree or a middle grades degree be in the hierarchy?

And sure, a teacher may have to go back to graduate school to get the pay raises to make it happen, but I make more money as a teacher than the average person with "similar degrees" in my undergraduate field. And I'll tell you that there was no way that my graduate degrees in education were comparable in rigor to graduate degrees in most other disciplines, the exceptions being other fields in which holding the degree basically equals an automatic pay raise so colleges create cash cow programs to get people through.

I think you nailed this issue although I will say that I think dropping out today may signal an level of fundamental life incompetence or unwillingness to get along with life that it didn't signal in the past. (Of course I don't mean everyone. We can all think of someone who dropped out because of life circumstances way beyond his or her control.)


What are you getting your master's in if you don't mind me asking?

When I'm talking about "similar degrees", I'm referring to master's degrees, primarily. An MBA and a Masters in Ed? Definitely not even close in pay. And most professions don't require that you go to grad school after you've started your job but it's a requirement to keep your certification for teachers here.

Funding here is strictly based on the number of students and a formula based on what a district was getting in 1994 when the method of paying for education was changed drastically. So some districts receive $11-12K per student while others are receiving $5K per student. It's quite skewed.

Counseling - Marriage and Family focused. Best way to practice in the field at the master's level.

While it is true to some extent that there's an anti-social aspect to dropping out today, I don't associate it with incompetence at all. Thinking of my clients, they were all capable, just a mix between unwilling and life situations - pregnancy or trying to take care of their family because of absent or incapable parents (sometimes legally sometimes not.) The only ones who might be considered 'incapable' would be the special education clients, and ironically they all graduated because as one put it "special ed is easy." They're just utterly unprepared to do anything other than get SSI or work in a workshop (the programs that don't take you when you're an addict, so not terribly helpful.)

I think the lack of jobs available for your average 16-18 year old drop out - the inability to say fine you're dropping out and you're going to work at X factory or in Y trade and be able to make a living, even a small one or a supplemental one to the family's is a major cause and/or perpetuation of poverty and often crime. NPR just did a story talking to a man who has no diploma or GED but has worked for decades, always able to get another job and is very highly skilled at this point. But then while hunting for a new job in the past several years couldn't find one as the GED/diploma question was an automatic decline of the application. Some people just aren't going to be able to do trig, or diagram a sentence, and there's not really anything wrong with that, it's always been the case.

If it's only about the piece of paper and not about the job skills then it's become a problem. Similarly to how the college degrees have progressed from "You must have your BA" to "You must have your MA/PhD." Status, class, money, all this stuff is intertwined into a major supply/demand issue.

/tl;dr it's complicated and not just as simple as one or the other.

In NJ, where they have Abbott Districts (funded by local and statewide tax money) some school districts are spending over 20k per student- in the worst districts.

Not all schools are failing, but the ones that ARE failing are doing so astronomically. When you get dropout figures that high (greater than 50%!) something is significantly wrong. If anything, it's a sign that the gap between top and bottom in our country is growing. While some suburban school districts are comparable to private academies in their offerings and success of graduates, some urban districts are failing at astronomical rates.

Not that it's the fault of teachers. There are way too many factors that go into it. Teachers may play a role (positive or negative) but they alone do not create the massive failure statistics.

Agreed with points mentioned above.

One of the issues in education is that our country is lagging behind in math and science education. A teacher's salary is not much compared to what an engineer or scientist can make in the private sector. It's hard to attract qualified candidates for those fields.

If we keep butchering what we pay teachers, or cut into the benefits they get, how will we ever be able to attract and keep qualified math and science teachers? Same for engineers and scientists who work for the government in other programs...but that is another topic.

Here I think there's a base from the state that's the same per kid in a particular course, there's a local supplement based on property taxes, then there are equalization grants that should provide additional money to poorer districts, but since they kind of follow the poorer kids, can end up going to the bigger and not particularly poor districts who have a lot of poor students, even if the poor students aren't a big percentage of the overall enrollment.

It still doesn't seem to affect achievement that much.

As far as degrees, I don't think it makes much sense to claim that an MBA has historically been the equivalent of a MEd. It may be the case now that so many colleges offer MBAs because BAs mean so little that the MBA is pretty dumbed down too. I think even looking at the average GPA and GRE or GMAT percentiles (or whatever the MBA people take) for admissions would reveal that, even now, it's typically harder to even enter to the program for the MBA.

If something is relatively hard to do or scare and it has value to employers, then I think you could typically get more money for it. To me that makes sense just on a supply and demand level.

When you require every teacher to get a masters, and they aren't particularly hard to get, and studies show that they don't do much for student achievement, and they don't have too much value to the outside labor market, then I think it's hard to expect them to drive up salaries that much relative to other professions.

But I think you are on to something with the MBA because I think business schools are setting up the same problem. If the market has a ton of undergraduate BAs in business, then people want MBAs to offer a credential that sets them apart and makes them more valuable. When every institution of higher learning offers a fast track, part time MBA, and the numbers of people with MBAs gets inflated, they may end up having as little relatively value in employment as the undergraduate BA and eventually the MEd.

I agree that the GED or diploma requirement might arbitrarily exclude people who can do the work, especially for older worker.

But since schools have had an enormous incentive with NCLB to get high school kids through (graduation rate is usually one of the secondary markers for high school AYP), kids who couldn't get through high school in the last five or so years may, for the same reasons they couldn't get though, be less desirable employees. If you can't make it to school because of your family obligations, you may be less likely to make it to work because of your family obligations, etc.

(Bizarrely, I'd say just as the public got the impression that academic requirements went up with NCLB, what really happened in terms of earning class credit is that the standards have probably gone way down. We have an online program in Georgia called Credit Recovery. If kids fail a class, they can complete it in CR sometimes in mere days or weeks.)

Well, in a perverse way, the overall economy stinking may make teaching look relatively more desirable.

And while there are some people who have engineering degrees and undergraduate degrees in math and science who then get certified to teach, there are also people who went a math or science ed route who may have credentials that aren't truly comparable to those working in STEM outside ed.

And isn't it be a little goofy to say that because a relatively small number of secondary jobs are hard to fill with qualified folks that all folks in the same general occupation should be paid more? Wouldn't it make more sense to offer higher pay simply for the harder to fill positions? One of the really amazing things that teaching unions and professional associations have pulled off is that all teachers k-12 should be basically be paid the same, regardless of the supply of people available to fill a particular job. As a humanities person, it's paying off for me, but it's a pretty irrational compensation system.

Might be, but I think that's false reasoning. There are a ton of reasons why someone isn't able to succeed in school and drops out rather than fail again. But then, we're talking about entire districts that are failing NCLB standards, too. I think the standards measure 'failure' but fail themselves to actually address the cause. SES being a HUGE one.
Don't think that exists here, here mostly I have young kids trying to get diplomas rather than GEDs before they age out of the district after spending several months in bootcamp though, so different perspective. (young = 19-21 usually)

I'm told that probably due to the economy, the armed forces are seeing a big rise in numbers of potential recruits and they want to see diplomas rather than GEDs. I know several kids who went to boot camps last year who intended to enlist when they were of age but they had gotten GEDS. :(

One boot camp instructor told me that they may now focus on the kids getting diplomas through the credit recovery program that UGAalum94 spoke of above rather than getting GEDs.

Rapidly declining international rankings in math, science and technology would probably be the easiest to start with ... and there's simply no way poverty accounts for the decline.

There's no doubt larger societal issues are part of the problem. But that's no reason to throw our hands up and say "shit, man - society, you know?" Schools can be a part of the solution - an educated population starts to fight the problems that lead to poverty.

My guys aren't eligible for military. The boot camp program I was talking about is the Impact Incarceration program in Illinois. The idea is that first offenders, particularly young adults, can serve 4 months in boot camp rather than their sentence. They get discipline, etc. and help out communities in natural disasters as well. But in my experience they come out on parole and get back in the same shit they were involved in. The majority have ruled out the military either from a lack of desire to get shot at or an assumption they can't get a waiver. And most of them probably can't get a waiver anyway.

It's sad, some of them, the ones who are really trying, would do well there. But put back in their same neighborhoods they end up back with the same rotating set of people in and out of trouble. It's an extra tangle to the issue.

In PA the undergrad portion of your science/math Ed background isn't much different, and can be exactly the same, as non-teachers. You get a degree in that field, and then go on to get the MS in Ed. I know people who have go e both routes- people who focused on Ed undergrad and science majors who career-changed with a MS Ed.

Here in PA the market for STEM is going crazy due to the gas industry. We have a hard time keeping environmental regulators- they work for the state for two years and then go into industry and literally make twice as much. I imagine anyone who is in high schol or college, interested in STEM, is not considering the education field, and as the gap between pay outside and inside grows, we will lose the ability to attract high quality teachers in those fields.

Fortunately in education there will always be those who want to do the job despite lower pay and difficult work conditions. But I imagine a few years in a difficult school with increasing pay cuts may make leaving look much more appealing. Not to mention the "axe" of layoffs that is perpetually hanging over their heads. As a society we are certainly not making teaching a very appealing profession- from the mass villianization to the layouts, to the increasing size in classrooms...

It blows my mind that gym teachers make the same as physics teachers! I didn't want to insult anyone by mentioning that but it really is relevant to the argument. In regulation the state has started to offer pay incentives to attract engineers to work for them.

...and yet they have no problem getting shot at on the street. SMH...

To be fair, I hadn't asked them - though I might do just to see what they think - I suspect that most feel no particular loyalty to the government. The government locks them up, they don't see LINK (very few get any assistance besides about $200 a month in food stamps, they're living with family because even working they can rarely afford their own place, and they have a hard time getting hired.) as something 'owed' to them, they take advantage of it because it's there and because they have to eat. Military isn't generally brought up at all due to the restrictions against felony convictions (and possibly substance abuse issues), which all my clients have by nature of being on parole.

I get two responses about the violence 1) Stupid kids closing their eyes and pulling the trigger and 2) If you live the life you take the risks. And in their eyes they have to live the life, they have no choice but to live the life. And then there are some who live it because they can make more in an hour than I do in a paycheck.

My county sends more people to prison per capita than Cook County/Chicago does. It's not a good place to be for my clients.

Wow. This is why I advocate ROTC programs in junior high and HS- esp in high risk areas. Give te kids a sense of belonging, pride, camaraderie and a real future. Many will only wind up turning to gangs for the same things.

While I pretty much agree with you and would add developing leadership skills and earning a relatively steady elective academic credit to your list, I have a friend who is a pretty extreme anti-war leftist who really hates that JROTC programs are concentrated in high poverty areas. He feels like we're basically saying that poor and minority kids should be recruited to be cannon fodder.

Drolefille, I don't know what it would cost, but since high schools can transfer out of state credits it might be worth someone looking into seeing if the online Georgia stuff could be used where you are.

It certainly also seems like it would be worth it for the boot camps themselves to look at offering it or for youth probation programs to do it. It's an online computer program, so it's likely to be relatively low cost compared to any kind of in person instruction.

Personally, I think it's complete junk educationally, but for the 18 or 19 year olds, it's probably better than nothing.

This is yet another wrinkle, I agree but don't all at the same time. There's a reason why our military is made up of the population it is, and there is a big class aspect to it.

There are both GED and diploma programs in the area, but I don't get them until they're out of high school for quite a while, at least with 4-5 months in bootcamp and typically expelled from their school if not from the alternative schools as well.
Boot camps offer GED programs here, it's just that it's considered a privilege AND there's only a limited time in which to complete it. I really don't know whether Georgia's programs would be comparable, but my clients really don't have the ability to navigate that whole process (or at least 95-99% of them don't. And they don't have the money to pay for it. And I'd guess that you have to be a GA resident anyway for funding reasons.

Ultimately, and I hate this answer, it is so far outside of my job description I don't have any ability to DO anything about it. Most of my clients are capable of getting a GED, it's just that there's a decent number who wouldn't need it if they could just get a trade instead.

Well, I have pointed out before that some other countries only test the brightest and best to begin with. Remember all the press around the Olympics about the Chinese athletes who get labeled as athletes early on? They are taken from their homes and trained in special training camp-like places and some of them don't know how to read because they focused only on gymnastics or ice skating, etc. Some of my Chinese co-workers at my last job admitted that kids are tracked at early ages and only those with skills in science and math end up being educated in science and math.

Compare those kids to all of the kids here? Not exactly a fair or realistic comparison. In Michigan, even my co-worker's child with Down's Syndrome takes the Michigan standardized test. She can't read. She's 15. She can't even speak. She takes the test. It's nuts, truly.

While I don't think we should throw in the towel, I think that focusing on teachers is the wrong approach. As a nation, teachers are being attacked as if they are the biggest evil in the country right now. Makes me want to say to people "You go teach middle school for a week and see how it goes".

Your friend is quite misguided. At their core, JROTC is a mentorship program, their goal is really no different than Big Brother/Big Sister or the Boys and Girls Club. That being said, there will always be a high concentration of mentorship programs in high poverty areas because that is where they are really needed.

Lastly, referring to people who enlist in the military as "cannon fodder" is just asinine and offensive.

[QUOTE=UGAalum94;2077129]While I pretty much agree with you and would add developing leadership skills and earning a relatively steady elective academic credit to your list, I have a friend who is a pretty extreme anti-war leftist who really hates that JROTC programs are concentrated in high poverty areas. He feels like we're basically saying that poor and minority kids should be recruited to be cannon fodder.[QUOTE]
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Actually, expanding the JROTC program to include high poverty areas opens new opportunities to kids who just a few years ago would not have a chance to participate in JROTC. There used to be a two tiered cadet training scheme in which JROTC targeted private prep schools and "top drawer" public schools while schools serving poor and minority neighborhoods were targeted for the NDCC or National Defense Cadet Corps. There were a lot of mealey mouthed explanations regarding the 'why' of this two tiered system but the bottom line was that schools whose demographic makeup was likely to produce commissioned officer material got JROTC. Schools more likely to produce enlisted personnel got NDCC programs.
JROTC in inner city schools, in my view, offers a more equitable and balanced approach than the previous one that was heavily weighted towards keeping student pools seperate and not equal.
The existance of a Corps of Cadets in any school provides a structure which develops discipline, leadership skills, some valuable basic life skills, and a sense of belonging to something which adhears to a set of values and instills pride in its members. The military is not looking for cannon fodder. Rather, it is looking for soldiers and leaders. That is as true now as in peace time or any time so long as we have a military.
As Plato remarked so many centuries ago, "only the dead have seen the end of war". So, it seems reasonable to give kids a sense of what they MIGHT have to deal with and a chance to get through it in one piece. The very basic level training received in JROTC can't hurt and surely can help in the challenges we all must face in dealing with life.
Now, the reality of JROTC is that it encourages college attendance which presupposes that four more years of education and its attendant maturity will better equip students for jobs and careers, and IF these students want to serve in the military they will be far more valuable as trained and educated leaders rather than the "cannon fodder" mentioned earlier. JROTC is neither designed nor structured to entice kids into 'signing up'. On the contrary, it seeks to shape and mold kids into solid types who are more likely to finish education and accept the realities of the world as it is and excell in it and not wallow the world of childish fantasy, rejection of structure and discipline, and expect to by some miracle become the beneficiaries of hopelessly unrealistic expectations.
Its a win-win proposition for kids in less than ideal circumstances as they are encouraged to stay in full time education, have the edge on being selected for Senior ROTC scholarships and Academy Appointments which provide subsidized education and a pay stipend at college level, and are offered an opportunity to serve in an honorable profession in a position of trust, responsibility, and authority. This obviously translates rather well to one's resume when looking to score an entry into a good job/career after service in the military.
My experiences in JROTC in the USA, Combined Cadet Force (CCF) in the UK, and Sr. ROTC at University were exceptionally valuable to me and I picked up some skills and basic savvy that I credit with being largely instrumental in my outfit getting back from Iraq with no one KIA. It has definitely helped me in dealing with the sometimes demanding aspects of my profession.

dekeguy
Captain(P), USAR

PiKA2001 and dekeguy, alas, my friend doesn't read Greekchat. He's more a protesting at the former School of the Americas than greek message board kind of dude.

I'm already pretty positive about JROTC, but I hope some other people read your messages!

Or you die or are disabled (Physically or TBI) and unable to work, or suffer from PTSD or commit suicide.

I don't think there's a real problem with JROTC but there are, obviously, very serious risks involved in the actual military. Particularly during a time when we're fighting multiple wars and have been at war for the past decade. It doesn't serve anyone to understate or ignore that.

[QUOTE=Drolefille;2077434]Or you die or are disabled (Physically or TBI) and unable to work, or suffer from PTSD or commit suicide.[QUOTE]

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Dulci et decorum est pro patria mori. Although I prefer General Patton's comment that the idea is not to die for your country but to make the other poor dumb son of a bitch die for his! [dekeguy]
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I don't think there's a real problem with JROTC but there are, obviously, very serious risks involved in the actual military. Particularly during a time when we're fighting multiple wars and have been at war for the past decade. It doesn't serve anyone to understate or ignore that.[Drolefille]

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Life in the real world by its very nature involves risk. Service in the military can be seen as about as risky as being a cop or a firefighter. The points one gets for service come not from cooling it in a nice safe place but going out in harm's way and taking responsibility and demonstrating courage, determination, and savvy.
With opportunity comes responsibility and with service comes a bit of danger. No one in the Army ignores or understates this. The more training, maturity, and savvy one can acquire the better prepared one will be. When one understands the risks and possibilities one is far better prepared to deal with the downside of it all.
As is the case with very many units which have been forward deployed my outfit keeps tabs on one another. I lost no one KIA but some of my troopers were wounded (I caught one myself). None of us have committed suicide, some stayed in the Army, some like Cincinnatus have returned to civilian life, all (I guess) have experienced some degree of PTSS but we deal with it, work through it, and drive on. Life is life, deal with it!
There is one other point which I think is worth mentioning. Through my readings and my Dad's stories of way back when, during the Viet Nam War, I found that ROTC was excluded from very many schools and universities. The recruiting pool was very limited and the services had to lower standards for selecting leaders. It is apparent to me that this situation brought about Lieut. Calley and the Mei Lai Massacre tradegy. Unprepared leaders not ready to lead and command and take responsibility for what they and their soldiers do or fail to do! So, I believe that JROTC begins the process of forming the leader who is responsible and able to command with some degree of wisdom and honor.
dekeguy

[QUOTE=UGAalum94;2077432]PiKA2001 and dekeguy, alas, my friend doesn't read Greekchat. He's more a protesting at the former School of the Americas than greek message board kind of dude.

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Protesting is fine with me, its what the Army protects to ensure one's rights to do just that. It would however make a bit more sense to me if he protested against something still in existance as opposed to the FORMER School of the Americas. If he doesn't like our current international operational involvements perhaps he should protest at the Dept of Defense or the White House or even stand for election to Congress so he could do something rather than complain about it!
[dekeguy]
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I'm already pretty positive about JROTC, but I hope some other people read your messages![UGAalum94]
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Please spread the word. Its important that people understand why we need programs like JROTC. It is by no means a brainwashing program to turn out little tin soldiers but rather an opportunity for young people to gain insights into responsibility, leadership, duty, and maturity.
dekeguy

Yay more dead people! That's the sort of line that works when one is IN the military, and I can see why, but isn't particularly motivational outside of it to someone like me.

My guys aren't becoming cops or firefighters either. I firmly believe that most people of all backgrounds don't want those accolades, they want to support their families. They can demonstrate many positive character qualities along the way, to be sure, but they don't need or want to prove their courage or get a gold star for it.

Aye but you were speaking in general to and about people outside of the military, it's not like I thought you were lacking in understanding of the risks.

Um, good for you guys?
This rather ignores that there are now more suicides in Afghanistan than combat deaths. Someone with full PTSD doesn't just deal with it and things get better. Their families generally suffer along the way and there has not been support available to them until relatively recently. The VA is just learning to handle having women vets receiving regular services.

A recent study showed half of veterans in college have suicidal thoughts, a third have severe anxiety and a quarter are depressed. Symptoms were found as clinically significant (that is they were severe and diagnosable) and 45% showed clinical signs of PTSD. We're just not doing enough to help them and brushing it off as "It's Life, Deal with it" does a serious disservice to those service members.
As I said, I'm not against programs like the JROTC or the military itself. That doesn't mean we should ignore the demographics of the military and the reasons for it.

dekeguy, I love to read your posts, but it would be a lot easier to follow them if you'd ditch the ======== and use the http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums...tons/quote.gif. ;)

[QUOTE=Drolefille;2077568]Yay more dead people! That's the sort of line that works when one is IN the military, and I can see why, but isn't particularly motivational outside of it to someone like me.
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Aww, I thought you would pick up on that somewhat tongue-in-cheek comment. No one really believes it is sweet and proper to die for your country, and no one wants to go home in a rubber bag. That was more of a sardonic crack than a motivational rallying cry. [dekeguy]
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My guys aren't becoming cops or firefighters either. I firmly believe that most people of all backgrounds don't want those accolades, they want to support their families. They can demonstrate many positive character qualities along the way, to be sure, but they don't need or want to prove their courage or get a gold star for it. [Drolefille]
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Please tell me you don't really believe that soldiers serve and go in harm's way for ribbons and medals. Of course people really just want to support their families and make a life for themselves and those they care about.
I suspect we are discussing related but fundamentally different aspects of this thread. I was responding to the 'cannon fodder' anti-JROTC position and you, I think, are responding to the opportunities (or lack thereof) open to those you are helping. I would, however, suggest that anyone who has a 'record' but is trying to be a solid citizen could get help from military recruiters who are under pressure to find enlistees. If the guy has a really terrible record and no mitigating circumstances then he would be unsuitable but if he is a guy who made a mistake, even a big one, but is now clean and squared away there are avenues available to him. [dekeguy]
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Aye but you were speaking in general to and about people outside of the military, it's not like I thought you were lacking in understanding of the risks. [Drolefille]
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Agreed, and I hope my comments could be read by anyone who had little or no knowledge of the military and be able to easily follow what I was saying. [dekeguy]
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Um, good for you guys?
This rather ignores that there are now more suicides in Afghanistan than combat deaths. Someone with full PTSD doesn't just deal with it and things get better. Their families generally suffer along the way and there has not been support available to them until relatively recently. The VA is just learning to handle having women vets receiving regular services. [Drolefille]
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Goes to my argument that training, maturity, and savvy are crucial in all soldiers and most crucially important in all leaders. Suicide suggests to me that the soldier was ill prepared for the stress of war and poorly led by under-prepared officers and NCOs. If one of my troopers took his own life I would consider that I had failed to train him, lead him, socialize him into the brotherhood of soldiers where we stand together and there is no time limit for these bonds to exist. I'll have to tell you about calls my Dad gets from some of his troopers who served with him before I was even born. (Which reminds me, your PM mail box is full).
Yes, families do suffer. Haven't you seen 't'shirts that say 'Army Wife' 'The toughest job you will ever have' Or 'Army Brat' 'Not easy but doggone proud'
Read Libby Custer's "My Life on the Plains" which addresses the stress and pain of family life in the Army. It was written in the late 1870s.
As to female veterans, we have had women in the Army for a long time but the numbers are far greater now. Not surprising the VA has to learn some new skills for these Vets. [dekeguy]
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A recent study showed half of veterans in college have suicidal thoughts, a third have severe anxiety and a quarter are depressed. Symptoms were found as clinically significant (that is they were severe and diagnosable) and 45% showed clinical signs of PTSD. We're just not doing enough to help them and brushing it off as "It's Life, Deal with it" does a serious disservice to those service members. [Drolefille]
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Mostly agree, but again, my limited experience suggests that a coheasive well led outfit provides a continuing support system for those who face death and far worse on a regular basis. All soldiers accept the fact the PTSD is real and all of us will experience it to some degree. We do however consider that the real brotherhood in a combat unit makes suicide an act viewed as a sense of breaking caste. Sometimes 'Deal with it' means go get some help from the medical guys. Sometimes it means reach down into your guts and find your character. Life is tough and sometimes you need help, just don't crack when your brothers are counting on you when the bullets are flying.
[dekeguy]
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As I said, I'm not against programs like the JROTC or the military itself. That doesn't mean we should ignore the demographics of the military and the reasons for it.[Drolefille]
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On that I agree 100% [dekeguy]

^^^ Oy!

To repeat:
And if you're wanting to quote more than one post, just click on http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums...iquote_off.gif in each post you want to quote (and watch it turn red), then click on http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums...tons/quote.gif or http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums...tons/reply.gif and voila! All the posts you want to quote will be there.

Please!

But that sounds awfully like techno savvy and dekes are not geeks! Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Ergo, if dekes do it, it's not geeky. ;)

Dekeguy may consider the jacked up posts to be his "thing." LOL. As a result, I don't read his posts if they are more than a few sentences.

If geeks do it, its not dekey?

As you probably know I can't pass up a straight line or a chance for a pun or wisecrack. Sorry.

Yay for using the quote feature.

Slow learner, but we plod along!

I actually asked
 

I took it with tongue in cheek, and yet all I see in it is tragedy.



I'd suspect very few are in it for the glory/ribbons/medals etc and hopefully most of those get shaped up before they get shipped out.
My guys don't have 'records' they have records. Felonys, typically drug or violent. See the second post though for some insight from them. I'm only aware of one time when someone came in and wanted to be in the military so bad that they had a recruiter come to our office and they worked things out with him. I don't know what his offense was.

However, I can understand how some people would see our soldiers as if they're being treated like cannon-fodder, particularly if the people who enlist are doing so for the money/schooling and it being the only way to support their families. It feels less 'volunteer' at some point when those pressures exist. Not that there's a solution per se. (Though sometimes Heinlein sounds right after all...)


They were, they just omitted the other side of things.
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Trained, mature and savvy soldiers commit suicide or consider it.
Not that preparation can't help, but I don't think that's true. Would you say suicidal teens are the fault of parents and teachers? Intervention can help, but mental illness is mental illness.

Many people would have similar feelings of blame and responsibility, they don't belong there.
Ah bother thanks, I'd cleared it and then it filled up without me realizing because I never empty the damned thing.



A recent study showed half of veterans in college have suicidal thoughts, a third have severe anxiety and a quarter are depressed. Symptoms were found as clinically significant (that is they were severe and diagnosable) and 45% showed clinical signs of PTSD. We're just not doing enough to help them and brushing it off as "It's Life, Deal with it" does a serious disservice to those service members. [Drolefille]
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Agreed, for a definition of PTSD/PTSS.

And do you see how this view might discourage your brothers from speaking up and seeking help? Seeing suicide as dishonorable doesn't prevent suicide, it means increased shame for suicidal thoughts and for the survivors.

Fix those quotes, Drolefille. :eek:

Oy done, but i left some of the = because i'm lazy.

/still haven't emptied the PM box, another oy.