I'm out of town for a few days, but this information was sitting in my e-mail inbox so I thought I'd pass it alone. I have done no research to verify any of this, but Sojourners is a pretty reliable source as a general rule. In the interest of full disclosure, my brother is an Air Force recruiter. Doubtless, he will comment here and we'll hear more about this from his perspective. Just remember, I'm older and tougher than he is.
Buried within the No Child Left Behind Act (called by my friend Anne the No Child's Behind Left Act), is a provision requiring public high schools to deliver students' private contact information to military recruiters. If a school does not comply, it risks losing federal education funds. Moreover, the Pentagon has assembled a database of 30 million 16-25 year olds (two of whom I birthed!), to serve as another recruitment tool.
So, Sojourners magazine and community is partnering with Working Assets and others in the Leave My Child Alone Coalition to make it eay to protect children from unwanted military recruiting by getting their names off both the school's and the Pentagon's lists. Click here to opt your child out: Opt Out
I have to say that, when recruiters were calling our house daily, I never had much trouble getting them to go away. Just say you're a pacifist. Your name probably goes in some "nut case" file, but I really don't care. But I've encouraged my kids to opt themselves out anyway.
Or, you could host an Opt Out back-to-school party. Names are generally delivered to recuiters in October. So it's important to get as many kids as possible opted out in September. So, from September 7-September 30, this same Coalition is sponsoring Opt Out parties. Hosting a party is easy. Teenagers don't even care if you clean; just serve pizza and all will be well. Sojourners will send you all the forms and information you need, as well as an explanatory DVD. Go here to register your party: Party Registration .
Feel free to investigate further before you take any action. And let me know if this information seems to be unreliable. But really... if it all pans out, opt your child out.
5 comments:
I deleted a spam comment re: somebody selling something. I didn't want anyone to think I deleted soemone's post because they disagreed with me!
I think I'm jealous. You've been blogging less than a month, and already you're getting comment spam. I've been at it more than a year and a half, and I hardly ever get any.
Hope you're able to get in and do some good for those folks--and be sure to tell them we're all thinking and praying for them. Help is on the way, no matter how ridiculous the president looked trying to convey that message yesterday.
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