.
Although the domestic consequences of poor education are relatively well documented, little has been done to investigate in what ways the failings of America’s public school systems will have long term implications for American national security and foreign policy prescriptions.
As a Council on Foreign Relations Task Force Report noted in 2012, “A world-class education system is vital to preserving not just the country’s physical security but also to reinforcing the broader components of American leadership, such as economic dynamism, an informed and active democracy, and a coterie of informed professionals willing and able to live and serve around the world.” Given the increasingly globalized nature of commerce and society, a lack of substantial investment in the intercultural competencies and cultural literacy of American youth will be crippling to U.S. dominance in the future.
Taking into consideration that the figure of the American population who has actively participated in the international combat engagements that the U.S. has undertaken since 2001 hovers at around 1% of the American population (and perhaps only slightly more if contracted personnel supporting the Department of Defense are included in that count), it would be difficult to argue that the American public has widely invested in these fights. Notably, those who are most likely to serve in today’s military come from families of those who have already done so, and while it would be hard to calculate in the broader numbers of American government officials and policy makers who have contributed to the study and execution of American national security objectives overseas, those who have borne the burden of these wars is embarrassingly sad for America as a “world superpower”.
As Ray Odierno pointed out during a 2014 speech delivered to the National Press Club, “Over the last ten years, there's been over 15,000 Awards of Valor given out to U.S. Army soldiers, nine Medals of Honor, almost 30 Distinguished Service Cross, 600 Silver Stars, and many other awards of valor because they did what we asked them to do; go and help provide security for this great nation of ours.” Yet despite these numerous awards, the fact that such a vast majority of the American population has not had direct tie to the application of U.S. foreign policy in the past decade is a topic of great concern. Because of this, many citizens can–and have–divested themselves of accountability to understand foreign policy, both in the shaping of their opinions, as well as in their voting practices.
The same 2012 Council on Foreign Relations report warned that, “The lack of preparedness poses threats on five national security fronts: economic growth and competitiveness, physical safety, intellectual property, U.S. global awareness, and U.S. unity and cohesion.” This is not merely a matter of civic engagement, but rather an issue of widespread under-education and lack of exposure to civilian-military cooperation and integration across broad swaths of American society. There is an important but under-resourced imperative that the U.S. cultivates such human capital to reinforce national security, given that military might alone will fail to produce a durable and stable American security.
Furthermore, our military may not be as mighty in the future as our national narrative recalls it being in the past. A recent study released by the organization Mission: Readiness assessed that approximately 70% of young Americans cannot serve in the military due to the inability of public education to “provide enough well-educated recruits to staff today’s advanced military.” This dangerous lack of academically qualified military recruits is accompanied by a broader shift in higher educational doctrine away from the humanities and liberal arts, and towards STEM subjects. But STEM does not teach students about hearts and minds, and it does not cultivate multiple intelligences about how to read and react to a variety of environments and circumstances.
A USA Today travel article written this past February reported that, “The percentage of Americans with passports is at an all-time high, and at 38%, up from 3% in 1974, that’s something to tweet home about.” While this is impressive growth over a 40-year period, this is also representative of a broader trend in American society wherein the other 62% of the population will likely display a broad lack of situational awareness about events of the world that we live in. A flippant but telling quip from a Special Operations Forces conference panelist held that, “War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.”
Relatedly, America cannot continue to produce public secondary school graduates who know appallingly little about our nation’s role in the world. As former Marine Benjamin Luxenberg argued in a January op-ed, with decreased exposure to and understanding of a variety of opposing political views, tolerance shrinks. A once-fluid American society with exposure to different cultures–even if only through strong immigrant communities within our own borders–is stagnating as exposure decreases.
In a country where a mere 38% of citizens hold a passport, many may ask what is the value of understanding the world beyond America’s increasingly fortified borders? Well, besides the basic privilege of exposure to art, literature, culture, and historical context exponential to that of America is the derived comparative understanding and appreciation of what our armed forces fight for and (volunteer) to defend.
At the 2015 Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict annual conference, former Special Forces Officer Mike Waltz–who worked with militias in Afghanistan–offered a memorable quote about the duration of the conflicts the American public is currently engaged in. A mullah with whom he worked commented, “Until America is prepared to commit your grandchildren to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our grandchildren, we cannot work with you.” Though we call them other things (the U.S. hasn’t declared “war” since WWII) the wars that we’re starting to fight these days are generational. Younger generations of students need to know about and understand the world that they’re growing up in so that they’re not playing catch up in their twenties and thirties as they begin voting and becoming active in civic engagement.
While most Americans do not share a religion or a culture, public education is part of a broad common identity that most Americans have experienced and identify with. What better common ground to start on?
About the author: Whitney Grespin holds a post-baccalaureate teaching certification, a Master’s in Public and International Affairs, and has experience managing international education and capacity building initiatives on five continents.
The views presented in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of any other organization.
a global affairs media network
Lessons to Learn: U.S. Public Education and the future of National Security
1453007
October 13, 2015
Although the domestic consequences of poor education are relatively well documented, little has been done to investigate in what ways the failings of America’s public school systems will have long term implications for American national security and foreign policy prescriptions.
As a Council on Foreign Relations Task Force Report noted in 2012, “A world-class education system is vital to preserving not just the country’s physical security but also to reinforcing the broader components of American leadership, such as economic dynamism, an informed and active democracy, and a coterie of informed professionals willing and able to live and serve around the world.” Given the increasingly globalized nature of commerce and society, a lack of substantial investment in the intercultural competencies and cultural literacy of American youth will be crippling to U.S. dominance in the future.
Taking into consideration that the figure of the American population who has actively participated in the international combat engagements that the U.S. has undertaken since 2001 hovers at around 1% of the American population (and perhaps only slightly more if contracted personnel supporting the Department of Defense are included in that count), it would be difficult to argue that the American public has widely invested in these fights. Notably, those who are most likely to serve in today’s military come from families of those who have already done so, and while it would be hard to calculate in the broader numbers of American government officials and policy makers who have contributed to the study and execution of American national security objectives overseas, those who have borne the burden of these wars is embarrassingly sad for America as a “world superpower”.
As Ray Odierno pointed out during a 2014 speech delivered to the National Press Club, “Over the last ten years, there's been over 15,000 Awards of Valor given out to U.S. Army soldiers, nine Medals of Honor, almost 30 Distinguished Service Cross, 600 Silver Stars, and many other awards of valor because they did what we asked them to do; go and help provide security for this great nation of ours.” Yet despite these numerous awards, the fact that such a vast majority of the American population has not had direct tie to the application of U.S. foreign policy in the past decade is a topic of great concern. Because of this, many citizens can–and have–divested themselves of accountability to understand foreign policy, both in the shaping of their opinions, as well as in their voting practices.
The same 2012 Council on Foreign Relations report warned that, “The lack of preparedness poses threats on five national security fronts: economic growth and competitiveness, physical safety, intellectual property, U.S. global awareness, and U.S. unity and cohesion.” This is not merely a matter of civic engagement, but rather an issue of widespread under-education and lack of exposure to civilian-military cooperation and integration across broad swaths of American society. There is an important but under-resourced imperative that the U.S. cultivates such human capital to reinforce national security, given that military might alone will fail to produce a durable and stable American security.
Furthermore, our military may not be as mighty in the future as our national narrative recalls it being in the past. A recent study released by the organization Mission: Readiness assessed that approximately 70% of young Americans cannot serve in the military due to the inability of public education to “provide enough well-educated recruits to staff today’s advanced military.” This dangerous lack of academically qualified military recruits is accompanied by a broader shift in higher educational doctrine away from the humanities and liberal arts, and towards STEM subjects. But STEM does not teach students about hearts and minds, and it does not cultivate multiple intelligences about how to read and react to a variety of environments and circumstances.
A USA Today travel article written this past February reported that, “The percentage of Americans with passports is at an all-time high, and at 38%, up from 3% in 1974, that’s something to tweet home about.” While this is impressive growth over a 40-year period, this is also representative of a broader trend in American society wherein the other 62% of the population will likely display a broad lack of situational awareness about events of the world that we live in. A flippant but telling quip from a Special Operations Forces conference panelist held that, “War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.”
Relatedly, America cannot continue to produce public secondary school graduates who know appallingly little about our nation’s role in the world. As former Marine Benjamin Luxenberg argued in a January op-ed, with decreased exposure to and understanding of a variety of opposing political views, tolerance shrinks. A once-fluid American society with exposure to different cultures–even if only through strong immigrant communities within our own borders–is stagnating as exposure decreases.
In a country where a mere 38% of citizens hold a passport, many may ask what is the value of understanding the world beyond America’s increasingly fortified borders? Well, besides the basic privilege of exposure to art, literature, culture, and historical context exponential to that of America is the derived comparative understanding and appreciation of what our armed forces fight for and (volunteer) to defend.
At the 2015 Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict annual conference, former Special Forces Officer Mike Waltz–who worked with militias in Afghanistan–offered a memorable quote about the duration of the conflicts the American public is currently engaged in. A mullah with whom he worked commented, “Until America is prepared to commit your grandchildren to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our grandchildren, we cannot work with you.” Though we call them other things (the U.S. hasn’t declared “war” since WWII) the wars that we’re starting to fight these days are generational. Younger generations of students need to know about and understand the world that they’re growing up in so that they’re not playing catch up in their twenties and thirties as they begin voting and becoming active in civic engagement.
While most Americans do not share a religion or a culture, public education is part of a broad common identity that most Americans have experienced and identify with. What better common ground to start on?
About the author: Whitney Grespin holds a post-baccalaureate teaching certification, a Master’s in Public and International Affairs, and has experience managing international education and capacity building initiatives on five continents.
The views presented in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of any other organization.
