Families Learn of Recruiters’ Lists -- and How to Opt Out

As the military struggles to meet recruitment goals, activists are intensifying efforts to educate parents about how they can delete their teenagers’ names from directories that schools are required to provide recruiters under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Their message is simple: All parents or students have to do is put in writing that the school may not release their contact information -- name, address and phone number -- to the military.

In Santa Ana, a group of women organized community meetings to alert parents about opting out. In Sylmar, student protesters have mobilized a delete-your-name campaign every time recruiters visit campus. And a group of Pacific Palisades activists has visited more than a dozen high schools throughout the region to distribute forms that students can use to strike their names from lists provided to the armed forces.

“We’re trying to inform people of their rights,” said Erika Herran, 16, a member of the Young Political Activists at Sylmar High School. “They definitely know more than before, but there’s still a lot more to be done.”

Under the education bill signed by President Bush in 2002, military recruiters must be granted the same access to high school facilities as colleges and prospective employers -- from setting up informational booths in the lunch room to handing out T-shirts to pique students’ interest. Additionally, schools must provide student contact information, unless a parent has told the school not to. A school district that fails to comply risks losing federal funding.

Recruiters use the lists to call students and visit them at home to tout the benefits of enlisting in the military. Staff Sgt. Roberto Sanchez, a Marine Corps recruiter in Los Angeles, said the lists were essential to his job.

“It saves us a lot of time in finding the individuals,” he said. Without contact information, “everybody would be walking up and down the streets” trying to find possible enlistees.

But critics say that releasing such personal information violates the privacy of students and their parents -- most of whom, educators and activists say, are unaware they can opt out.

“The whole purpose is to educate the parents and the students in our country about what is going on in their campuses and what options are available to protect themselves,” said Deborah M. Vasquez, a member of OC Mujeres en Accion, a Santa Ana woman’s social justice organization that holds community forums on what it calls the military’s “predatory practices.”

Military officials said they were seeing more such activism, which they call “counter-recruitment.”

“We see that all the way up and down ... the Western states,” said Capt. Carolyn Nelson of the 12th Marine Corps District in San Diego, which oversees West Coast recruitment efforts. “All individuals have a right to know what’s out there. We don’t discourage it, we don’t encourage it. Everyone has freedom of speech.”

The military pushed for the equal-access provision in the No Child Left Behind Act to counter a growing hostility to recruiters at some schools, especially on the coasts, and to deal with a shrinking pool of potential enlistees, as more teenagers than ever -- two out of every three, according to the Department of Labor -- go on to secondary education. At some schools, it has long been a tradition to provide student contact lists to colleges and, in some cases, employers.

Among the armed services, the Army is having the most difficult time meeting its recruitment goals. The Army fell more than 7,800 soldiers short of the nearly 55,000 enlistees it needed between Oct. 1 and June 30, while the Army National Guard fell more than 10,000 short of its goal of nearly 45,000 enlistees, according to the Department of Defense. The Army and Navy reserves and the Air National Guard also fell short.

The Army’s shortfall is due to an improving economy and the war in Iraq -- not counter-recruitment efforts, said Douglas Smith, a spokesman for the U.S. Army Recruiting Command in Ft. Knox, Ky.

“Is it hindering us? Not really,” said Nelson, the Marine recruiter.

No one tracks how many students have opted out of the No Child Left Behind Act’s provision. But educators report, anecdotally, that they are increasingly being asked to make an effort to inform parents and students of this right.

In March, more than two dozen teenagers at Century High School in Santa Ana formed Students for a Democratic Society, a namesake of the 1960s organization that protested the Vietnam War.

Co-founder Modesto Briseno, 18, said members were driven by frustration over weekly visits from military recruiters, who arrived on campus in sports cars and held push-up contests during lunch to attract students’ attention.

The group has passed out pamphlets challenging the benefits of joining the military as well as form letters that students or parents, if the student is under 18, could use to excise their names from contact lists.

At Sylmar High, the Young Political Activists took on visiting recruiters by, among other things, making an anti-recruitment documentary that they screened at a local coffeehouse where they encouraged students to sign opt-out form letters.

“We set up booths during lunch to try to give kids information every time recruiters come with their Hummers and all,” Herran, the student activist said. “Not a lot of kids know about [opt-out forms].... We’re trying to make that more widespread.”

Community organizations are also trying to spread the word.

Palisadians for Peace visits a different high school every other Tuesday, distributing opt-out forms to students before classes begin.

On a recent trip to Huntington Park High School, activists talked to many parents and students who were unaware that their contact information was being given to recruiters.

“Read this. It’s important,” Christa Wilk, 71, told students as she handed them brochures and opt-out forms printed in Spanish and English.

Sara Torres, 16, was surprised to learn that her school could release her address and phone number without her consent. “I don’t like that,” said the sophomore, who said she planned to ask her parents to sign the opt-out form. “I didn’t know they could do that.”

But her friend Norma Toro, 15, said she planned to follow in her brother’s footsteps and join the military after graduation. “It’s an opportunity, something different,” she said.

Orlando Terrazas, the father of a Whittier High School student, grew concerned after his son told him that a military recruiter made a lengthy presentation to his school band. Terrazas called the school, and was dismayed to learn that his son’s information had been turned over to the military.

Terrazas’ complaints and those of other parents prompted the school district to adopt a new policy for the coming academic year: Officials are sending letters to all students to inform them how to opt out of the lists.

“We realized that we needed to improve communication to our parents so they would know their rights [and] what they can do to exercise their rights,” said Ron Carruth, an assistant superintendent in the 14,000-student Whittier Union High School District, where fewer than two dozen opted out in prior years.

The move satisfied Terrazas. “We were thrilled,” he said. “Last year, it was a nondescript sentence buried in the middle of documents.... Now, it’s a full-page form, and it’s going to be at the front of the registration packet in color. It stands out.”

Some school administrators and board members say the requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act leave them walking a fine line, often proclaiming their support for the troops overseas while questioning recruiting tactics at home.

“I believe in the armed services for some kids. Some of them don’t know what they want to do in life -- sometimes the military can give them structure,” said Denise Mansfield-Reinking, a trustee with the Anaheim Union School District, which plans to send its first opt-out form letters to parents soon.

“I am not against the armed forces in any way,” she said. “But when they start calling kids in the 11th grade [without parental knowledge], I have a little bit of difficulty with that. It’s such a young age.”