<p>marite - Harvard students are still allowed to take ROTC. They do so through a cross town program and several Harvard students are in the NROTC program. They do not get credit for their course work nor does Harvard support the program, allow ROTC students to mention ROTC in the yearbook or provide a place to meet on Harvard's campus.
ROTC was kicked off Harvard's campus in 1969.</p>
<p>It is easy to find a plethora of information by googling rotc and Harvard -
this article shows how the elimination of ROTC was first brought by students but is maintained by very vocal tenured professors: ROTC's</a> controversial history at Harvard - The Boston Globe</p>
<p>Finally - there is no reason to defend the "military's" power to enforce DADT. The "Military" has no choice. They did not make the rule. Congress made the rule.
Stanford and Harvard can support or not support DADT - their prerogative.
What they shouldn't do is use it for a thinly veiled excuse for not supporting those who choose to become a military officer.</p>
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There is no reason to think that Harvard or other top schools would not welcome ROTC back if DADT were repealed.
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<p>if you look at the chronology of events there is plenty of reason. First it was the draft in an unpopular war. This was brought about by student protest. Then during the 80's there was plenty of conversation about bringing it back - once it came back the conversation shifted. Since it was peacetime and we were not fighting unpopular wars the faculty needed another excuse. About this time gay rights were becoming a popular cause. Converstaion heated up at Harvard from the mid -80's through the mid -90's.
When President Clinton signed DADT - this became and excuse - nothing more, nothing less for a very left and tenured faculty to give ROTC the boot.</p>
<p>I have no reason to believe that repealing DADT cause Harvard to allow ROTC back. They will simply find another excuse.</p>
<p>What draft? What war?
The students I knew were attending Harvard on ROTC in the 1980s. The ban on ROTC FOLLOWED DADT. The Vietnam War was OVER! And the Iraq war had not happened. And there is no draft, hasn't been since 1969.</p>
<p>Larry Summers was seriously considering bringing back ROTC. But he had to resign over other issues. Drew Faust began discussions about it; but these have been put on the backburner along with many many other topics because of the financial crisis.</p>
<p>EDIT: Here is an article from 1993 discussing the probable ban of ROTC at Harvard following the PENDING adoption of DADT.</p>
<p>ROTC was brought back and then banned again after years of debate. the debate began shortly after ROTC came back - with a gay rights bent. It was pretty hot and heavy before DADT.
The banning of ROTC was the result of two years of discussion that began before DADT.</p>
<p>I've just deleted a post. Justamom, you are right about the 1969 decision to force ROTC off the Harvard campus. I did know several students who were in ROTC at Harvard, one graduating in the early 1980s and one around 1991. I never asked them where they did their training.
But the hubbub around DADT happened in 1993.
At Drew Faust's inauguration, ROTC cadets were given a prominent role, which seemed to some to herald the return of ROTC on campus, as Larry Summers had advocated. But, as I wrote, the focus on the financial crisis has pushed everything off to the backburner.</p>
<p>I've always thought that sending ROTC students to MIT was hypocritical, a way for Harvard to have its cake and eat it, too.</p>
<p>it was written in 2003 and doesn't mention DADT.
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<p>Given the fact that it's written by an AEI fellow, it doesn't surprise me the went down that path. The article was written during a time when lawsuits were being filed from law schools and their students to prevent JAG from recruiting at their respective schools.</p>
<p>JustAMomof4 - the clarification was helpful. Marite really had me confused. Also thanks for the helpful links.</p>
<p>It is my understanding that the financial aid that most Ivys offer can easily supercede a student's ROTC scholarship. So Ivy students who opt to participate in ROTC are probably not doing it solely for the scholarship money. </p>
<p>On CC parents and students often discuss the value of service. My impression is that these ROTC/Ivy students are involved in serious, mature service.</p>
<p>From the Time article I gather that Harvard students take an additional military class every semester -in addition to a standard courseload - and get no credit for that class? Not even a mention in the yearbook? In addition, I think they also must participate in physical training several times a week.</p>
<p>These present ROTC/Ivy students must have been preschoolers when DADT was instituted. It seems shortsighted to assume that they agree with the policy because they want to serve. The refusal of Ivys to support ROTC students appears to me like an example of "the ends justify the means." </p>
<p>In the long run I think it will hurt our country (and already has) and these great institutions to disregard these students who have a desire to serve.</p>
<p>Kudos to Drew Faust - she's brave and goodhearted, I think.</p>
<p>I do not think that military training courses are recognized as academic courses, which is why ROTC students do not get credit. A student taking music lessons at a nearby institution would not get credit, either.</p>
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These present ROTC/Ivy students must have been preschoolers when DADT was instituted. It seems shortsighted to assume that they agree with the policy because they want to serve. The refusal of Ivys to support ROTC students appears to me like an example of "the ends justify the means."
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<p>Joining ROTC is voluntary. It does not matter if one agrees with DADT or not. Lots of private clubs have had and may continue to have policies discriminating against certain demographic groups that date from many decades ago. Joining them is a way of expressing at least lack of discomfort with the policies. Which is why many individuals who run for office think it wise to drop their membership in such clubs.</p>
<p>I did not know about the yearbook ban. Is this information correct? It would seem an infringement of freedom of expression.</p>
<p>This article only mentions Harvard, Yale, and Columbia. It even throws MIT in there, which is not Ivy League. Thanks Time for not mentioning my school or the other Ivies that participate in ROTC.</p>
<p>ROTC cadets/mids get credit for their courses at every college that participates in ROTC. Some schools even offer a leadership minor or military science minor to those who complete the entire program. They are academic classes.
For Army ROTC students take a course every semester. The first two years are open to any student on campus. They are generally military orientation and leadership classes and normally 2 credits. Thus they are taken on top of their normal course load.
Contracted students are required to take a lab as well which is generally one afternoon a week and one Saturday a month. PT (Physical training) is also sometimes required - this depends on how well the student performs on the physical fitness test given once a semester and/or if they are in a sport, varisty, club or intramural.
NROTC is similar.</p>
<p>Colleges who do not have a ROTC Battalion on campus but have their students participate at a host school offer credit for ROTC courses. In many cases the Professors of Military Science - all of whom have advanced degrees - travel to participating schools and offer the classes on the students' own campus.</p>
<p>ROTC instructors are forbidden from doing this at Harvard, hence the students must commute to MIT several times a week.</p>
<p>I will look for the source that refers to the yearbook ban. It appeared credible to me.</p>
<p>I graduated from high school in 1971, and my class was the last to get draft lottery numbers. I believe that the draft was still going on, although at a less active level. Registration for the draft was not eliminated until 1975.</p>
<p>Regarding the rigors of ROTC, I knew several people who were in Navy ROTC at MIT during the late 70s. Summer duties included learning to sail and shoot at Newport, RI, and another summer on a ship cruising the Mediterranean. (I use the word "cruise" because that's what the Navy called it, not to suggest that a warship is like a cruise ship.) While I believe they spent a lot of time chipping paint, which is an unpleasant task to say the least, it wasn't unrelieved horror by any means. And they were definitely doing it for the scholarship money. I believe there was a stipend also.</p>
<p>I'm not saying that ROTC isn't a significant commitment. But it is as lacking in balance to be uniformly worshipful about those who choose to do it as it is to condemn it.</p>
<p>Consolation, do you have any current (post 9/11), first-hand knowledge of ROTC students at Ivys?</p>
<p>Marite, I'm fairly sure that ROTC students are obligated to serve in the military after graduating from college. That's a significant difference from being in a college club. It's not commensurate with a fraternity, sorority or final club. (Is that your reference re: Ted Kennedy and the Owl?)</p>
<p>I have to admit, I just did a quick look at this posting- but I know Cornell has ROTC and some of the surrounding schools in NYS have their own ROTC students enrolled in the Cornell program. As Cornell is the land grant school in NYS (it's complicated goes back to the morell act of 1862 or something like that) my guess is that ROTC has and will always continue at Cornell as military studies (as well as agriculture and other types of studies) is mandated at land grant institutions. I also believe that MIT is considered a land grant institution, so that may explain why ROTC is present on the MIT campus.</p>
<p>Shiloh:
Of course, ROTC students are obligated to serve in the military upon graduation. That is the quid pro quo.
I was responding to the post where it was suggested that because students nowadays were born after DADT, it was unfair to those who joined ROTC to hold them responsible for the military's discriminatory policy. And my point was that no one forces students to join ROTC and that by joining an organization, one is tacitly endorsing that organization's policies. Someone who joins a golf club which discriminates against blacks could just as easily claim that the discriminatory policy was adopted before he took up golf or even was born. It usually does not sit very well with the general public.
That argument is only directed at the logic of the post, not about the question as to whether ROTC should or should not be banned from campuses because of DADT or some other reason.
My own views about ROTC and the military more generally are similar to the views I hold toward Rick Warren or, for that matter, Rev. Wright. The good they do (and I think we need a strong and well trained military) far outweighs the negative they say or do. I personally would not object to ROTC being on all college campuses.</p>
<p>Marny: You are right about MIT being a landgrant school affecting its policy toward ROTC.</p>
<p>I don't know where I stand personally on the DADT policy in the military...but I would have to think I lean towards agreeing with it. The people who fight the policy...calling it prejudice and what not, usually don't have any military experience. I think it would be easy to argue that the majority of America's soldiers are conservative, and that this could present a problem to them fulfilling their duties/protecting gays in the military. I don't like it, but I have to go along with it because it might just be the best policy to ensure a fully functional military that operates at full performance.</p>
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Spend some time at a real elite institution before you come to these conclusions. You're ignorance is stunning yet not too surprising since you probably don't know anyone who attends these schools, nor could you get in.
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<p>For someone who dislikes ad hominem attacks, stereotyping, and completely prejudiced conclusions, you are certainly doing a good job of doling them out yourself. And obviously most of the people you are arguing against couldn't get in - they are parents. So please, stop with the blatant elitism, and stop pretending you are better than they are. You aren't.</p>
<p>Also, as the poster above me argued, you have to consider the military implications of not having DADT. Homosexuality is tending towards more culturally acceptable, and its fair to argue that one day it will be seen as completely normal, except by the small minority of evangelicals on the conservative side. However, currently, there is a strong aversion to gays by many members of the military, something that cannot be eliminated (both my friends who will be joining, incidentally one through ROTC, hold these viewpoints.) If they knew others were gay, they would be less inclined, whether consciously or subconsciously, to protect them, save them, or fight alongside them. Naturally, as also observed above, this would hamper military efficiency. Our country's safety ought to take precedence above all else (as long as it is not societal discrimination, which DADT isn't), including the repealing of DADT. It would be foolish to argue that our military is unimportant, and instituting policies which would undermine said military is a very, very imprudent course of action.</p>
<p>Edit: I myself support equality for gays, and everything like that, but I likewise believe that all situations have to be looked at objectively and rationally.</p>