[Publib] Military recruiters & libraries: WAS Army and homelessand Army P...

[Backwage at aol.com]

In a message dated 9/21/2007 10:55:35 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
houghton-jan at smcl.org writes:

Does  anyone have any
document that states the military is an educational  institution, or any
military-produced document that says that?  I was  unable to find
anything in my searches.  Doing searches for  "education" and other
related terms on the websites of various branches of  the military, in
the first 50 results or so on each I could not find not  one mention of
education while in the service.  


Most of the enlisted people go to one or more schools to learn trades, and  
so on.  That mechanical equipment and electronics and those aircraft, not  to 
mention the ships, are all maintained by folks trained by their respective  
services.  The services are the largest vocational training outlet in the  
country--not simply because they have to do the job, but of course because the  
outside schools have fallen behind in this.  For that matter, the military  
operates three service academies, a few graduate schools and a foreign language  
institute, in addition to training quite a few doctors, nurses and other  
professionals.  
 
See:  _http://www.usuhs.mil/_ (http://www.usuhs.mil/) , _http://www.nps.edu/_ 
(http://www.nps.edu/) 
 
When I was in there, I went to a three-month school to become a postmaster,  
the same training that you had to be in the civilian postal service for many  
years to earn.  The school was greatly compressed--we were in class 12  hours 
a day except for time operating the base post office.  And that was  just to 
be a lowly postal clerk.  There are cook schools, automotive  mechanic schools, 
you name it.  You should see the schooling for the  nuclear ratings, or for 
electricians.  There are dozens of schools, just in  the navy alone.  One of 
our ALA Council members is a navy Intelligence  Specialist; ask our friend Karen 
Schneider how much the Air Force sent her to  class.  
 
In other words, they take seventeen year-old kids and spend tens of  
thousands of dollars to train them to do something that most of them won't do  for 
longer than four or six years before going civilian.  God, I wish I'd  learned to 
be a welder!  And did I mention that I took my first college  courses on 
board a navy ship, bound for Japan?  And they cost me  nothing.
 
I would love to see such things offered in the civilian world, or, now that  
I think about it, to have the military offer a librarian school.  We'd show  
up you townies, all right.
 
M. M. 



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