Don't We Want Guns And Bigotry Out of Our Schools? by Sam Diener (a digested version of this piece was published by the SF Examiner as a letter to the editor on Tuesday, June 27, 1995) Imagine a national organization proposing to run a program in the SF Schools. They'll call it leadership training, but it will mostly consist of giving and obeying orders. It will teach the students to carry and shoot guns. The curriculum, which glorifies "wiping out" Native Americans and contains misinformation about AIDS, will be dictated by the organization without District oversight. As for instructors, no lesbians, gays, bisexuals, or people with disabilities need apply. The program will recruit students into an organization which uses deadly violence to achieve its aims. The activities will include ritual hazing that will be covered up by instructors, at the extra cost of only a few lawsuits. It will cost the district $575,000 per year. Will the School Board violate its own policies against discrimination and guns in schools and spend our money to promote violence? They already have. The program, run by the military, is called JROTC, the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps. The Pentagon runs these programs in 2200 schools nationwide, including 8 here in San Francisco. The Pentagon's JROTC expansion program has sparked controversy across the country. School Boards in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Columbia, Missouri, and Cottage Grove, Oregon, among others, have recognized a bad deal when they've heard one. They've rejected JROTC. The San Francisco School Board has the opportunity to reverse the damage already done when they vote Tuesday, June 27th on a proposal by Steve Phillips and Dan Kelly to replace JROTC with nonviolent, non-discriminatory youth leadership development programs. The day before, the S.F. Board of Supervisors will vote on a resolution, authored by Tom Ammiano, to support this move. Superintendent of Schools Rojas admitted at a budget hearing on June 19 that if we replaced JROTC, we would have enough money to hire ten academically credentialed teachers (JROTC instructors need no such credential, nor do they need college degrees) to run alternative programs and still have a surplus of between $100,000-$125,000. (Note: Since this piece was published, we discovered that the District overestimated (or lied about) the number of students in SF JROTC by 300 students. Therefore, it would only be necessary to hire eight certified teachers to run alternative programs. Thus, the surplus would be between $200,000-$225,000.) Exciting alternative programs include: YouthBuild USA, which teaches youth to build low-income housing while teaching leadership and cooperation skills; the Community Studies and Service Program, which has already demonstrated its effectiveness in a demonstration program at 6 high schools; The Real Alternatives Program, which has proven its effectiveness with at-risk youth and needs $30,000 to survive; Firefighter training, which already exists and could be expanded; Community Educational Services, which provides literacy and self-esteem training for immigrant students; the Student Empowerment Project, which has been demonstrating for and developing multicultural studies; Project 10, to confront homophobia throughout the district; and the California Conservation Corps, which has a track record of integrating service, physical activity, and life-skills training. The question is not whether alternatives to JROTC exist, the problem will be in deciding among the many worthy alternatives. It's time that San Francisco sent a strong signal to the Pentagon that discrimination is not acceptable. Neither are guns in schools. It's time San Francisco sent a strong message to youth that we live by the nonviolent, anti-discriminatory values we preach. It's time the School Board replaced JROTC. Sam Diener is a high school teacher who coordinates the national Stop The Military Invasion of Our Schools Campaign at the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors. The Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors (CCCO) was founded in 1948 to protect and promote the rights of conscientious objectors to war. We promote conscientious opposition to war by curtailing the militarization and military recruitment of youth, stopping the expansion of JROTC, assisting GI's who face military injustice and educating young people and the public about conscientious objection, the draft and alternatives to military service. We are a consensus-based egalitarian national organization with offices in San Francisco, CA and Philadelphia, PA. CCCO 415-474-3002, 415-474-2311 fax 655 Sutter #514, San Francisco, CA 94102 [email protected] 215-241-7196, 215-567-2096 fax 1515 Cherry St., Philadelphia, PA 19102 [email protected] Stop JROTC Hotline: 1-800-NO-JROTC (1-800-665-7682) (brand new!) Part of the GI Rights Network Hotline: 1-800-FYI-95GI (1-800-394-9544)