Puerto Ricans Say No to Kids Becoming "Colonial Cannon Meat"
At the bottom of the leaflet was a tear sheet that students could sign and later hand to teachers, to request that students' personal contact information not be released to the U.S. Defense Department or to anyone involved in military recruiting.....As a result, 57 percent of Puerto Rico's 10th-, 11th- and 12th-graders, or their parents, have signed forms over the past year withholding contact information from the Pentagon -- effectively barring U.S. recruiters from reaching out to an estimated 65,000 high school students.
The requirement of providing information to the Pentagon is part of the No Child Left Behind Act.
Under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, all schools receiving U.S. federal funding must provide their students' names, addresses and phone numbers to the military unless the child or parents sign an opt-out form.....Juan Dalmau, secretary general of the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP) [says]his efforts are saving the island's children from becoming "colonial cannon meat."
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Antiwar advocates have even gained direct access to Puerto Rican classrooms under a controversial directive issued last September by Rafael Aragunde, the island's education secretary, granting "equal access" by pacifist groups and military recruiters.
The effort is achieving its desired effect:
Bill Carr, deputy undersecretary of defense for military personnel policy....said he suspects that opt-out rates for states in the continental United States rarely break beyond 10 percent -- a far cry from the nearly 60 percent on the island.
The military's reaction:
Maj. Ricardo Sierra, who runs eight of Puerto Rico's 14 Army recruiting stations, rejected the notion that anti-recruitment efforts are affecting his operations. High school students are not his target demographic, he said, because few speak English well enough to pass military entrance exams. Instead, Sierra said, recruiters are meeting targets by contacting college-educated students.
One of Puerto Rico's daily newspapers says polling shows 75% of the island's residents oppose the war.
Puerto Rican military deaths are big news items on the island.
The funeral in March of Army Cpl. Jason Nunez, 22, proved particularly emotional. In images broadcast throughout the island, his mother removed the U.S. flag from her son's coffin and deliberately dropped it to the floor. She later implored other parents not to allow their children to fight in the U.S. military.
Puerto Rico's Education Secretary Rafael Aragunde also had this to say:
"You don't want children fighting on the streets, you don't want children cheating, nor stealing, and you don't want them to think that an alternative to solving any conflict is war," he said. "I feel it's my obligation to defend that value."
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