The United States Army’s “Army College Tour” visited Grand Valley State University (GVSU) today. The Tour, one of the Army’s efforts to increase lagging recruitment, consisted of an “interactive area” setup on the middle of GVSU’s campus featuring a rock climbing wall, a motion simulator, a booth for creating personalized “dog tags,” networked video games, and plenty of information about the supposed “benefits” of enlisting in the Army.
The Tour is part of the $2.6 billion the Pentagon spends annually on recruitment. The money is used to fund a variety of slick promotional tools including the development of video games, the use of the internet, personal visits by recruiters, commercials, and other efforts designed to target youth. The Army Tour at GVSU focused on the money enlistees can earn to pay for either college or student loans and the job skills that can be obtained by serving in the military. However, two-thirds of enlistees never receive money for college and only 15% will earn a four-year degree. Most people can receive more money for college via a Pell Grant or a Stafford Loan than they would by serving in the military. Moreover, the job skills one gains are typically only of use in the military and few veterans report making use of their skills in their subsequent civilian jobs. Recruiters are allowed to distort the truth when speaking with potential enlistees and section 9.5b of the enlistment contract allows the military to renege on promises made by recruiters.
Despite only 24 hours notice, a number efforts were undertaken by students in order to counter the Army’s presence on campus. Students chalked messages near the tour, including slogans such as “most enlistees receive no money for college,” “fund education not war,” and “war is not a video game.” Large posters were hung around campus containing facts about recruiting (for example, that two-thirds of enlistees never receive any money for college) and anti-recruiting slogans. Throughout the day students distributed a variety of anti-recruitment pamphlets and leaflets and a flyer outlining the myths and realities of recruiting were posted throughout the campus.
The effort to counter the Army College Tour at GVSU is expected to be one of the first of many counter-recruiting activities in West Michigan. A number of different groups, including some at GVSU, have begun talking about organizing counter-recruiting campaigns. Among the efforts talked about thus far are publicly challenging recruiters, distributing information about how high school students can “opt-out” of having their information given to recruiters, and working towards removing them from local high school and college campuses.
