True to Her Traditions – At Last

November 11, 2011

(Guest post by Greg Forster)

On Veterans Day two years ago I posted a sharp condemnation of my grad school for its contempt of the military, even in defiance of its own traditions. In the comments, I made a promise that I would be prepared to post something more cheerful for Veterans Day “when the Ivies quit spitting on the people who fight and die to preserve their right to spit on them.”

Yale is bringing back ROTC, along with Harvard and Columbia. Princeton refuses to budge. Brown is still considering its position. Cornell, Dartmouth and Penn had already brought it back before this year.

I’m not sure at what point my stated obligation to “post warm fuzzies about mom and apple pie” kicks in, and I’ll admit that I don’t think the series of events leading up to these developments generally augers well for civil/military relations. But that war is over and now is a time for reconciliation. Six of the eight Ivies now offer military training within their for-credit educational curricula. That is progress.

4 Comments | civic values, higher education | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Greg Forster

True to Her Traditions

November 11, 2009

Yale WWI

(Guest post by Greg Forster)

The monument pictured above is quite large and centrally located on the Yale campus. When you walk into a nearby building, you enter a small atrium of solid marble walls, covered from floor to ceiling with the inscribed names of Yale alumni who have died in military service for their country.

Neither the monument nor the atrium recieve any attention from the people who walk by them every day. Students sometimes take advantage of the monument’s prominent location by taping fliers to it advertising their beer-and-sex parties.

ROTC has been banned from Yale since 1969.

Happy Veterans Day.

6 Comments | civic values, higher education | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Greg Forster