Military School

[October 11th, 2006] In a plain white building behind a giant security fence in Northeast Portland, 50 Winterhaven School students Monday were trying to "blow up" their teacher.

Although the teacher was never in any actual danger, some parents in the Portland Public Schools think the children were.

The fourth- and fifth-grade students were "blowing up" their teacher as part of a science experiment with balloons on a field trip to the Jackson Armory and Portland Air Base, facilities operated by the Oregon National Guard.

The program, called STARBASE, is funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, and one of its goals is to introduce kids to the military. It had several Winterhaven parents so irritated they decided to keep their children away from Monday's field trip.

"Call me a purist, but I think the Department of Education should fund education," says parent Liz Cerabino-Hess.

About a dozen of Winterhaven's 60 fourth- and fifth-graders didn't attend the first day of the five-day field trip, making the Winterhaven students from Southeast Portland the largest group of conscientious objectors in the program's 13-year history in the city, according to program director Marilyn Sholian. Their plan was to skip the program's other four days, too.

"We found it impossible to separate the program from the government's other efforts to make us comfortable with the idea of war," parent Mike Bruns writes in an email to WW, explaining why he and his wife, Becky, kept their son out of school Monday.

The voluntary program is paid for with a $200,000 grant administered by Portland Public Schools, which keeps about $11,000 for managing the money. Much of the rest of the funding pays the salaries of the five district employees who run STARBASE, although they have no connection to the military.

The exposure of young children to the military has parents like Bruns alarmed. He doesn't want his 9-year-old son to be the soft target of a subtle campaign that he says is designed to promote the culture of war. And at a time of war, when the Air National Guard happens to be facing a nationwide personnel shortage, parents say outreach efforts aimed at kids are particularly troubling, even if exposure to the military comes packaged in fun and valuable lessons about science and technology.

National Guard spokesman Randy Noller says exposure is not indoctrination. "It doesn't mean we're twisting their arm,'' he says.

Meanwhile, military recruiting at Portland's high schools has long been controversial. So why, parents ask, aren't programs such as STARBASE, which incorporate military personnel into the lesson plans, given the same scrutiny? It could be because the program's benefits outweigh the price of the military's soft-sell campaign.

Each year, about 1,300 students attend STARBASE classes in Portland, and only about three students on average skip out, says Sholian.

After students at Laurelhurst Elementary attended the program, their teachers raved about it.

"To me, the learning experience is incredible," teacher Jan Greene says in an email forwarded to WW by a Portland Public Schools spokeswoman.

But Bruns' assessment of STARBASE is not just a liberal conspiracy theory. Creating a positive image of the military is one of the stated goals of the $13 million nationwide program, which also teaches kids about technology and avoiding drugs by using materials that wouldn't otherwise be available to students when the district is trying to stretch public dollars.

According to annual STARBASE surveys that ask kids to rate statements like "military bases are fun," student attitudes toward the military improve as a result of STARBASE.

And that's exactly what Winterhaven parent Laura Wendel, who has sons in the fourth and fifth grades, worries about.

Sholian defends the program, saying, "To me as a parent, it's no different than letting my kid go to a soccer camp." STARBASE is simply exposing kids to something new, she says. "Nobody anywhere is recruiting them."

Counters Wendel: "Last time I looked, soccer camp wasn't funded by the Department of Defense."