Essay 2 Final Draft
In the recent years recruiters in the military have been struggling to meet their goals and are having a hard time finding new people to join their ranks. In 2018 the service had a “recruiting reckoning” when the Army fell short of its goal by more than 6,000 new soldiers (Myers). They had to try new recruiting techniques to appeal more to the Generation Z high schoolers, they started going on more social media platforms and it was a game changer in military recruiting. Although social media helped in some ways there was still the challenge of connecting with people in certain parts of country that would be considered “the ghetto” or more poverty stricken.
In the article “The Recruiters- Searching for The Next Generation of Warfighters in A Divided America” by Adam Linehan, he talks about the time he spent with the recruiters of the Mid Atlantic Recruiting Battalion in East Orange, New Jersey. There is roughly 80,000 people that reside in the area covered by the recruiting mission but most of them don’t meet enlistment standards due to tattoos on the hands, face, and neck, physical and mental-health issues, or have some type of criminal record, or don’t have a high diploma or GED. Only about 29% of the people in America between the ages 17-24 are eligible to serve Linehan stated. The recruiters used social media platforms in attempt to reach out to the younger generation but they needed more effective ways to engage with the community. They started going out to local and school sport events, block parties, the mayor’s office, going to parks, bus stops, Linehan said even one recruited told him that he would play Pokémon Go to engage with the community in an informal type of setting. He then talks about how the most important factor was the health of the economy, the higher the rate of unemployment the more people became interested in joining the military; Linehan states “the more economically stressed, socioeconomic classes tend to be underrepresented in the armed forces. Although people in low-income neighborhoods are generally more inclined than their wealthier compatriots to enlist”.
Linehan then talks about how a recruiter, let’s say in North Carolina doesn’t have to work nearly as hard to get people to come in as a recruiter in New Jersey would, this is because the northeast has become “disconnected from the military” said Lt. Col. Edward Croot, the once Commanding Officer of the recruiting battalion, so they wanted to figure out how to get more people to become more interested in joining the military. They didn’t use unethical recruiting practices like lying or telling half-truths, covering up information, or helping recruits cheat on entrance tests. They found that if they were honest and made an impact on the community and helped people, that they would be more trusting of them and not just view them as the recruiters who are trying to take members of their community and just send them off to war but realized that they were there to help. Linehan talked with Staff Sgt. Herenson Duvelasint, who came from Haiti to East Orange New Jersey with his mom when he was 8. He talks about how Duvelsaint is the best recruiter in East Orange getting almost twice as many people to join compared to the other recruiters. Me personally he doesn’t say it in the article but I think that has to do with how members of the community can understand and relate with his childhood growing up in the same town he is recruiting in.
Linehan then talks about how “Essex County, which is home to roughly 800,000 people condensed into 22 tightly clustered municipalities, has the most extreme income disparity in New Jersey (and it’s growing). And the physical boundaries between rich and poor hew closely to the ones between black and white. Driving west from Newark, through places like Maplewood, South Orange, and Montclair, median household incomes leap by more than $70,000 in a matter of just a few miles and continue to climb as the neighborhoods become whiter. East Orange and neighboring Irvington, which together account for the majority of recruits inducted through Haddock’s center, are more than 85% black. The percentage hovers around 1% in North Caldwell, the county’s richest borough.” He ends the article talks with Staff Nasteshia Robinson, a female recruiter who told him who she wants to help the people in the area get out of poverty and escape abuse. She talks about how other the recruiters joke about how East Orange is a “war zone” and she say that “This is America. They are Americans.” And I took that as she thinks that the people in community regardless of race or social class should be treated with equally.
Being in the military myself I have definitely seen some of the things talked about in Linehan’s article as far as unethical recruiting practices, many service members are told many false hopes about the military, many are promised bounces but aren’t told the “fine print” like they have to complete and pass all these different courses in order to get the money and if they don’t pass, they don’t get what they were originally told but instead just given another job and it is only after signing the dotted line that they find out. As far as the topic of diversity regarding race or social class I have to say, the military is definitely doing a better job with that. I served with members of all races; white, black, latino, Asian, even served with people who have got their citizenship by joining the military. If I’m being honest most of the people I served with, I’d say probably about 70-75% came from similar backgrounds as my self and didn’t have a lot of money growing up regardless of race. I was in the Marine Corp though I couldn’t speak on the ranks of the Army but in his article on Starts and Stripes, Corey Dickstein Talks about how the Army ranks; but in his article on Stars and Stripes Cory Dickstein states the Army has seen improvements in diversity in people joining the army with 47% of the 62,150 recruits the Army shipped to basic training being non-white, an improvement from recent years. Although the Army meet their goal for 2020 although it was much smaller compared to the year before but for 2021 the Army has increased its target number of new recruits in infantry career fields by rough 3,500; they are even offering contract incentives up to $25,000(Rempfer). Once covid hit recruiting virtual online became one of only options being that everything was shut down.; it’ll be interesting to see how the Covid pandemic will affect the recruiting process over these next couple of months maybe even years.
Work Cited
Dickstein, Corey. “Army hits 2020 recruiting, retention goals amid pandemic, but top officials say more diversity needed”. Stars and Stripes.com, 9 October 2020, https://www.stripes.com/news/us/army-hits-2020-recruiting-retention-goals-amid-pandemic-but-top-officials-say-more-diversity-needed-1.648068
Linehan, Adam. “The Recruiters: Searching for The Next Generation of Warfighters in A Divided America”. Task&Purpose.com, 28 November 2017, https://taskandpurpose.com/community/east-orange-army-recruitment-divided-america/?src=longreads
Myers, Meghann. “Services met recruiting goals as COVID forced military to modernize, SECDEF say”. Military Times, 15 October 2020, https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/10/15/services-met-recruiting-goals-as-covid-forced-military-to-modernize-secdef-says/
Rempfer, Kyle. “Army seeks about 3,500 more infantry recruits this year”. Army Times, 29 October 2020, https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2020/10/29/army-seeks-about-3500-more-infantry-recruits-this-year/