By moving the goalposts... Just before the holidays, the National Priorities Project released to the media its analysis of military recruits <http://nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06> in 2006. The story appeared in a major piece in the Los Angeles Times <http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-draft24dec24,1,3762290.story?coll=la-news-a_section>, which The Chicago Tribune ran as a front page article and a dozen other major media outlets, including The Boston Globe and The San Francisco Chronicle, published as well. I've copied below our press release for your information as well. Hope your 2007 is off to a good sta rt. Best, Pam Pamela Schwartz, Outreach Director
*Army Fails to Meet its Own Recruitment Benchmarks;* *Wealthy Recruits Continue to be Under-Represented * Northampton, MA -- The Army filled its ranks in 2006 by ignoring its own benchmarks for recruits' education standards, according to an analysis of *2006 military recruitment data <http://nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06>*released today by the National Priorities Project (NPP), a non-profit research organization that studies the local impact of federal policies. According to the Army's benchmark, 90 percent of new recruits should have a high school diploma. In 2006, 73 percent of all new recruits met this requirement, a drop of 13 percentage points since 2004. "While President Bush talks about expanding the troops to fight the war in Iraq, the Army is already going after kids who haven't had the privilege of finishing high school," said Anita Dancs, research director of the National Priorities Project. "It appears that the Army's ticket to recruitment success is finding young men and women with limited opportunities." At the same time, 2006 Army recruits from wealthy neighborhoods -- those with median household incomes of $60,000 and above -- continued to be under-represented at about the same level as 2005 and more so than in 2004, according to the NPP analysis <http://nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06>. The low- and middle-income neighborhoods were more over-represented than in 2004. State and county military recruitment data and analysis are available at www.nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06 <http://www.nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06>. "The answer to these inequities or shortfalls in military recruiting is not a draft," Dancs continued. "Instead, we should be talking about how we can ensure these young people get a quality education and avoid this devil's choice by not engaging in wars of choice." The NPP analysis <http://nationalpriorities.org/militaryrecruits06> indicates that the states with the largest proportion of high-quality recruits were: North Dakota (59 percent), Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Ohio, Pennsylvania and South Dakota. All of those except for Nebraska and Wisconsin had recruiting rates (recruits per 1000 youth population) below the national average. None of these states had a proportion of high-quality recruits equal to the national average of 2004. The states with the lowest proportion of high-quality recruits were: Mississippi (35 percent), Alabama (37 percent), Arkansas, Louisiana, Nevada, Georgia, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Hawaii, and Tennessee. Of those, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Rhode Island were below the national recruiting rate. -30- ----- If you received this email from a colleague and would like to join our email list, please email us at [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> to subscribe.
