Return
to the "POINTER VIEW"July 26, 2002
Return
to the "POINTER VIEW"
July
26, 2002
WASHINGTON (Army News Service) -- The Army’s latest summit on secondary education resulted in more than 50 recommendations, ranging from creating a commander’s handbook to providing schools with soldiers’ family care plans.
Delegates from 22 states came up with suggestions briefed to Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric K. Shinseki July 10 at the end of the summit. One work group focused on approaches to help Army families gain favorable in-state college tuition policies. Six others came up with strategies to implement a memorandum of agreement on secondary education.
The Army began a study in 1999 to better understand the effects of mobility on high school students and provide recommendations to ease the impact. Out of the study came a memorandum of agreement, which officials said is the framework for establishing common practices among school systems.
"There were no recommendations made to improve the ‘Secondary Education Transition Study and Memorandum of Agreement’," said Dr. Elaine Hinman, director for DoD’s Domestic Dependent Elementary and Secondary Schools. She explained rather that the focus was on strategies to "institutionalize" the SETSMOA initiatives among the 92 school districts that have signed it and others that have yet to sign.
Change happens through professional development, said Hinman, who oversees schools in seven states along with Guam, Puerto Rico and Cuba. School counselors and school district leaders need consistent high-quality training on the highly mobile military child, she said.
Adding SETSMOA instruction to regular training for both military leaders and civilian educators was one summit recommendation. Others included: establishing a SETSMOA handbook for installation commanders; providing schools a copy of soldiers’ family care plans; and creating practices that are consistent among all who sign the memorandum of agreement.
Some inconsistent practices among school districts are: how school records are released to students, criteria for extracurricular activities and grading practices, Hinman said. This can be resolved by SETSMOA partners sharing their best practices, she said. The challenge is going to be communicating standard practices when personnel changes take place, she added.
During the summit, when Shinseki asked how many installation commanders were aware of the Army’s memorandum of agreement, only half raised their hands. Continuity dies after personnel changes because the word doesn’t get out to new parents or commanders, said Lt. Gen. James Hill, the I Corps and Fort Lewis, Wash., commanding general.
"Out of the nine commanders who originally pushed for the memorandum, only two are here today - including myself," said Hill. "Which goes to the heart of the problem. So as we move forward, we need to address how to keep the momentum going as installations change personnel."
Not only do people change, but school district policies frequently change also, said the spokesman for the SETSMOA workgroup.
"Each school district has its own set of polices, and they often get in the way of successful transition for school children," Hill said.
The Education Summit is a way the Army is taking care of it’s own, but parents have the primary responsibility for managing their children’s education, Shinseki said.
Students who attended the conference recommended that the best way to get the word out to parents on the SETSMOA is through a commercial.
Forces Command volunteered to get started on creating a video that would highlight the SETSMOA, to get more parents educated on its existence. Maj. Gen. James Donald, FORSCOM’s deputy chief of staff for Personnel and Installation Management, took on the project.
"Forces command is the largest major command, and it is appropriate that we share in the responsibility of making this endeavor work," Donald said.The SETS study was started to benefit the transitional high school student, officials said. Summit recommendations, though, covered grades beginning with kindergarten and extending through college.
Recommendations on how to obtain in-state college tuition rates for more military families was briefed by Michael Tevnan, a program manager in the Education Division at U.S. Total Army Personnel Command. He said ideally, military family members should have in-state status in both their state of legal residence and the state in which they are residing. In addition, he said students should also retain in-state status if they are enrolled in a school and their family moves.
"Soldiers are working in these states, raising their kids in these states, but they never qualify for the benefits of living in these states," Shinseki said. "This is a problem, and we’re hoping that it can be solved."
The largest problem is that criteria vary for determining the eligibility for in-state tuition, Tevnan said.
"The Army is not trying to dictate education policies for the states," Tevnan said. "Research must be conducted to clarify the actual policy for each state and determine if it is uniformly applied throughout the state."
To keep the momentum going on the tuition initiative, Shinseki assigned a general officer to organize a steering committee.
"I envision an organization made up of commanders from all services, civic leaders and educational representatives making recommendations to steer everyone in the right direction," said Brig. Gen. Antonio Taguba, commanding general for the U.S. Army Community and Family Support Center.