National ROTC Coverage: 2013

• January 2013 American Legion Magazine article "The Return of ROTC".  Note:  The article details the history of universities and military training, going back to 1775, and including the Morrill Act of 1862 and the Preparedness Movement founded in 1914, for which the Ivy League was "a hotbed".
• 7 January 2013 Chronicle of Higher Education article "Columbia U. Succeeds in Recruiting 'High-Powered Veterans' to Campus".  Note:  "Today, as the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down, Columbia's School of General Studies, as the program is known, has become veterans' Ivy League destination of choice.  This year, 271 undergraduates are enrolled there with education benefits from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs—about three times as many as at the rest of the Ivies combined... the students are fully integrated into the university, taking the same courses and choosing the same majors as traditional students do."  Among veterans, "the word was out, as one veteran puts it, that "Columbia was the place where high-powered veterans went.""
• 13 January 2013 Stanford Daily op-ed "ROTC and the Academy are Compatible" by Dominick Healey.  Note:  "After a quick perusing of the “Stanford Says No To War” website, I found myself laughing at the absurdity of “evidence” being presented against the ROTC program at Stanford... In my military science courses, we spent the majority of our time discussing the philosophy of ethics, the politics of the Near East, the history of our nation and even got to slip in some theology with a 25-page paper on the injustice of the Iraq War within the framework of Walzer’s just war theory. I fail to see how the study of history, philosophy, theology and political science falls outside of the realm of “significant issues, themes, ideas and values of human identity and existence.”"  He suggests that anti-ROTC students pay attention to ROTC students: "You are going to find out that there was a whole population of men and women who were developing themselves at light speed while you were trying to shut them out, and you will be competing with thousands of us in the real world. We keep our hair cut close, we keep our faces shaved clean and we keep our bodies in shape. We can wake up at 0530 any day of the week, work a 20-hour day and then do it over and over and over again. We don’t need vacations, we don’t need weekends, we never sleep through our alarms and we’re never late for appointments. We’re respectful, we’re honorable, we serve others selflessly, we always tell the truth, we know how to shake hands, we know how to speak publicly, we’re excellent managers and we’re excellent leaders. We’ll be responsible for 50 people and millions of dollars of equipment, on our first day. We’ll have real people’s lives in our hands, we don’t break under pressure, we make the right decision quickly and we’re highly trained at applying our highly educated minds to highly challenging problems. We’ll have done all this before we’re 25 years old."  See response on 15 January. 
• 17 January 2013 New York Daily News article "York College gets first ROTC program at CUNY campus in 40+ years".  Note:  "The program, which actually began in the fall of 2012, is an effort to diversify the military’s officer ranks, ROTC officials said. The vast majority of the students at the school are minorities and many also come from low-income homes... ROTC programs are also planned for other CUNY campuses at Medgar Evers College, in Brooklyn, the City College of New York, in Harlem, and the College of Staten Island."
• 17 January 2013 Fox News article "Harvard ROTC policy less generous than other schools".  Note:  If a Harvard student gets an ROTC scholarship, the university will reduce or eliminate its financial aid, even if the student still ends up paying university fees. Rick Coveno, father of a Harvard student whose financial aid was stopped by Harvard.  "From our perspective, ROTC is earned money from her five-year service commitment in the military and it's not some grant or other free money.. That's very little incentive, almost a disincentive to do all that extra work for ROTC when, if you do nothing you get about the same amount of financial aid."  "MIT and Boston University say the size of ROTC scholarships varies from cadet to cadet, but they allow students to eliminate loans and the amount they're expected to earn working before cutting need-based financial aid".
• 24 January 2013 Columbia Spectator op-ed "A better ROTC: Changing the way women are treated in the military" by Prof. Helen Benedict.  Note:  A Columbia Journalism school professor whose work inspired one of the first class-action suits against the Pentagon on behalf of women and men who were sexually assaulted in the military, notes that "most assailants are of superior rank to their victims" and suggests that ROTC students "should be rewarded for responding properly to reports of assault and bullying, and punished for trying to cover such reports up". 
• 7 February 2013 Harvard Crimson article "Women on the Battlefield: ROTC Responds".  Note:  In discussing the need for women in combat units, Carolyn F. Pushaw ’16, a Naval ROTC student notes that in many Middle Eastern cultures, “There’s such a gender divide that we need women to associate with Middle Eastern women in situations where men can’t really do that”.
• 11 February 2012 Stanford Daily article "Female ROTC cadets look forward to combat eligibility".  Note:  Lauren McCune ’15, an ROTC cadet, said "The one thing that makes a big difference to me is that I’ll actually be able to be the S2, the strategy [and] risk-assessment officer attached to each platoon, and now I could get to be with an infantry platoon".
• 26 February 2013 The Sagamore (Brookline High School, Massachusetts) article "Joining the US military".  Note: Brookline High School guidance counselor Clifton Jones notes that “In more affluent communities, families are against the military coming in and doing presentations... For the Marines, it is difficult for them to come in. And that is why we think we have less and less kids” going into the military.  Undeterred, a high school student writes an article about serving in the military and ROTC.
• 15 March 2013 Harvard Crimson article "U.S. Navy Awards Faust for Welcoming ROTC".  Note: "Navy Secretary Ray E. Mabus presented the Navy Distinguished Public Service Award to Faust in a surprise ceremony in his Pentagon office for her “total commitment to the NROTC.”"
• 21 March 2013 Brown Daily Herald columns "Taking Sides: Should Brown bring ROTC back to campus?" by Dorothy Lutz ’13 and Mika Zacks ’15.  Note:  Lutz argues that Brown is creating "a counterproductive anti-military bias on campus" by being the lone Ivy League college to continue to effectively bar ROTC, and this reduces campus diversity.  Zacks, who was a conscientious objector to the military draft in Israel, argues that just as she objected to having a non-combat role in the Israeli military, Brown should not allow any ROTC program to have its official sanction and thereby contribute to American "imperialist violence".
• 11 April 2013 Release of "Bridging the Gap", a film on the civil-military gap and military training on campus.
• 29 April 2013 The Atlantic article "Can ROTC Solve Its Minority Problem?" by Colin Daileda.  Note: With the expansion of ROTC in the New York City area, the writer profiles a student from Brooklyn in a military course who would have considered ROTC if it had been available earlier.  The interest of NY colleges in the military "hasn't gone unnoticed: Former four-star General David Petraeus recently announced that he will be a visiting professor for a year at the City University of New York's Macaulay Honors College."
• 5 May 2013 Daily Princetonian article "Despite combat ban reversal, Princeton ROTC cadets' plans remain unchanged".  Note:  "Eight out of the nine female ROTC cadets interviewed for this article, including four of the five enrolled at the University, noted that they wish to serve in the military in non-combat positions.... Hannah Martins ’13, a graduating female cadet at the University who has already been assigned to the military police branch, said that she is hopeful about the changes outlined in Panetta’s January decision but also noted women have already been serving in harm’s way for a long time."
• 20 May 2013 New York Times commentary "R.O.T.C. Returns to New York’s City College More Than Four Decades After Removal" by Don Gomez.  Note:  "When I attended City College a few years ago and spoke with college officials about bringing back the Reserve Officer Training Corps, or R.O.T.C., they dismissed the idea as impossible. The wounds from those wild days during the Vietnam War were still too raw. But in an afternoon ceremony on Tuesday that Colin Powell — the former secretary of state and retired four-star general who happens to be a City College graduate — is expected to attend, Army R.O.T.C. will be welcomed back to the City University of New York, with its headquarters at City College... In the spring of 1969, according to City College’s student newspaper, The Campus, student anti-war activists disrupted an R.O.T.C. recruitment event by dumping buckets of ox blood on the registration table as baffled officers and students looked on. It was one of numerous examples of how the boutique R.O.T.C. program at City College, once the largest in the nation, had become embattled as a symbol of American power... Bomb threats to Harris Hall, home of the R.O.T.C. office, were typical, causing many evacuations. Masked men and women banged on doors to disrupt R.O.T.C. classes until professors dismissed the cadets for the day. Student activists held counter-marching formations on campus, walking alongside the cadets during their drills, cursing them and carrying the black flag of anarchy next to the cadets’ American flag."
• 21 May 2013 New York Times article "After Decades, Boots Are Back on Campus".  Note:  Former Secretary of State and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell and others were present as New York's City College welcomed back ROTC.  "But three professors stood outside the ceremony holding antiwar placards, protesting what they see as the remilitarization of their school. “Bringing back R.O.T.C. cheapens our curriculum,” said one of them, Bill Crain, a psychology professor. Mr. Powell, a former secretary of state, passed the protesters on his way into the hall. “Don’t agree,” he said, “but you’re entitled.”"  For a discussion of the issue of whether the cultures of the university and the military are compatible on questioning authority see this issues page.
• 25 May 2013 Cornell Chronicle article "ROTC students receive commissions as officers".  Note:  Rear Adm. Christopher J. Paul of the U.S. Navy, deputy commander of Naval Surface Force Atlantic, said "In other walks of life, human failings may pass unnoticed. In our walk of life, their consequences are almost devastating. … What ensures our success is that our military superiority is matched only by the superiority of our ideals and our unconquerable love for them."
• 29 May 2013 Harvard ROTC Commissioning Ceremony.
• 29 May 2013 Harvard Magazine article "The Right Way to Honor Veterans".  Note:  At the ROTC Commissioning ceremony, Harvard President Drew Faust "quoted Admiral Michael Mullen, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, speaking at West Point, who said the military’s work was appreciated, but added that he feared that people “do not know us” and the burden service members endure."
• 29 May 2013 "Remarks at 2013 ROTC Commissioning Ceremony" by Harvard President Drew Faust.  Note:  Faust said "We are in danger of becoming what Admiral Mullen calls “a people uninformed.” That was a significant part of why I was committed to welcoming ROTC back to Harvard. As citizens, we have an obligation to understand our military and to ensure that it and its members do not stand apart from our national life. We must take responsibility for our interdependence."
• 29 May 2013 Address by LTC David R. Downer '63 at Harvard ROTC Commissioning.
• 30 May 2013 Harvard Crimson article "ROTC Commissioning Ceremony 2013".  Note: A photo gallery from the ceremony.
• 23 July 2013 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel op-ed "Marquette and ROTC: University should keep officer training on campus" by Kevin Miller.  Note: A theologist with a PhD from Marquette argues that ROTC and a Jesuit university are compatible because Catholicism regards military service "can be permissible, even necessary" and that pacifism was "a minority view in early Christianity".  He concludes "Marquette is right to offer an opportunity for officer training along with education in the Catholic moral tradition and conversation about its application to contemporary issues of war and peace".
• 23 July 2013 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel op-ed "Marquette and ROTC: Alliance with military training is contradictory" by Daniel C. Maguire.  Note:  A theology professor at Marquette argues that ROTC and a Jesuit university are incompatible because "the Catholic just war theory" demands the right to "selective conscientious objection to particular wars" while US law recognizes only a generalized conscientious objection to all wars. 
• 30 September 2013 CNN article "Naval ROTC to return to Columbia University".  Note:  A ceremony will mark the return of ROTC to Columbia after a 40 year absence.
• 30 September 2013 Remarks of Sean Wilkes '06 at Columbia ROTC Return Ceremony
• 1 October 2013 Columbia Spectator article "Naval ROTC program celebrates return to Columbia’s campus".  Note:  The 5 Naval ROTC students report that "Most people don’t know anything about ROTC being back on campus”.  Part of the reason is that the students do their ROTC classes at SUNY Maritime in the Bronx, and the commute is time-consuming.
• 2 October 2013 Yale Daily News column "ROTC’s prejudice, Yale’s complicity" by Scott Stern.  Note: Stern argues that ROTC violates Yale's policy about discrimination against transgender people. 
• 4 October 2013 Wall Street Journal article "ROTC Closes in Some Schools in Shift to Larger Cities".  Note:  "The Army is closing 13 Reserve Officers' Training Corps programs at colleges in mostly rural areas because the schools were producing too few officers to justify the ROTC presence.  Instead, the Army will invest in new scholarships and programs in larger cities, hoping to capitalize on renewed interest in officer training programs in New York, Chicago and elsewhere... Under Defense Department rules, Army officer training programs are expected to produce an average of 15 officers a year from each school. The programs being closed were producing far fewer and showed little prospect for growth, according to Army officials."
• 15 October 2013 American Enterprise Institute article "The return of ROTC to New York City" by Cheryl Miller.  Note: Miller notes that "the renewal of City College ROTC marks a move by the Army toward reengagement with New York City and with other areas currently underserved by military recruiting policy".
• 11 November 2013 Columbia University news article and video "Columbia Celebrates Return of Naval ROTC".  Note:  At the 30 September ceremony near the Columbia campus, Columbia president Lee Bollinger said “This is more than just the return of Naval ROTC to Columbia. It is really a historic moment in which a breach is repaired after four decades... We value you for many reasons, but one of them is that we think the diversity of perspectives that you bring to the University is highly significant, one that I see myself in the classes that I teach.”
• 6 December 2013 Daily Princetonian photo essay "In the Nation's Service: A Lens into R.O.T.C.".
• 8 December 2013 Doonesbury cartoon claiming people in the military have no recourse if sexually assaulted by their commander.  Note: Multiple military sites make clear this claim is false, including here, here and here.  If the commander was the accused, then the service member could be transferred away from the accused by the next commander in the chain of command. 

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