I thought we were trying to win this...
LA Times is reporting that the military has lowered standards for recruits in response to low enlistment numbers.
The Army used to accept only 2% of its recruits to be from the 2nd lowest quintile, but they will DOUBLE that number to 4% now.
That means they will accept twice as many people who scored better than only 16 to 30 percent of others who took the test. That, my friends, is low. To put it into perspective, the 30th Percentile of the SAT is 300.
The military has been trying to defeat the stereotype of soldiers being unintelligent for years. The 'Army of One' and new 'Preparing yourself for the future' campaigns have attempted to portray the brave soldiers as competent and intelligent. How can this be rectified with the decreasing standards for our troops?
If we continue to lower the standards, we will not succeed. We need another method. The person who 'gives up finding Mr(s). Right' will never find him/her. They'll settle. They'll be unhappy.
Will lowering the standards mean success? No. If we take stupider people, how can we believe that we will be successful?
With this misguided and mismanaged war, it isn't worth it to enlist. Once we end this mistake, recruitment will go back up. Right now, the cost vs. benefit of enlisting is not worth it.
Constant guerilla warfare without a noble cause means people aren't interested- regardless of increased scholarships, higher pay or ads telling us 'what soldiers do on their off-time.'
*****
UPDATE: When you take into account late 20th/21st century warfare, the 'dumb soldier' does not work. No more are the days of hand-to-hand-charge-and-fire tactics. Today, we use smart-bombs and most soldiers carry laptops or PDA's. How can someone who scored so low effectively use this technology? Less qualified soldiers must consider this technology to be more of a burden than a benefit.
The Army used to accept only 2% of its recruits to be from the 2nd lowest quintile, but they will DOUBLE that number to 4% now.
That means they will accept twice as many people who scored better than only 16 to 30 percent of others who took the test. That, my friends, is low. To put it into perspective, the 30th Percentile of the SAT is 300.
...the Army would also ease the service's requirement that at least 67% of every recruiting class be made up of recruits who scored in the top half (50th percentile or above) on the aptitude tests. The new threshold would be 60%...
The military has been trying to defeat the stereotype of soldiers being unintelligent for years. The 'Army of One' and new 'Preparing yourself for the future' campaigns have attempted to portray the brave soldiers as competent and intelligent. How can this be rectified with the decreasing standards for our troops?
If we continue to lower the standards, we will not succeed. We need another method. The person who 'gives up finding Mr(s). Right' will never find him/her. They'll settle. They'll be unhappy.
Will lowering the standards mean success? No. If we take stupider people, how can we believe that we will be successful?
With this misguided and mismanaged war, it isn't worth it to enlist. Once we end this mistake, recruitment will go back up. Right now, the cost vs. benefit of enlisting is not worth it.
Constant guerilla warfare without a noble cause means people aren't interested- regardless of increased scholarships, higher pay or ads telling us 'what soldiers do on their off-time.'
*****
UPDATE: When you take into account late 20th/21st century warfare, the 'dumb soldier' does not work. No more are the days of hand-to-hand-charge-and-fire tactics. Today, we use smart-bombs and most soldiers carry laptops or PDA's. How can someone who scored so low effectively use this technology? Less qualified soldiers must consider this technology to be more of a burden than a benefit.
posted by zerohundred @ 1:39 PM
<< Home