Posted by
Catmman on Friday, June 19, 2009 9:53:04 AM
So says Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Gary Roughhead.
Diversity,
NOT educating and grooming this nations future Naval leadership (who amongst their classes in diversity and multi-culturalism might have some extra time to learn about naval warfare and defending the United States) is the goal.
The Naval Academy superintendent, Vice Adm. Jeffrey Fowler, echoed him. Everyone understands that "diversity" here means nonwhite skins.
Fowler insisted recently that we needed to have Annapolis graduates who "looked like" the Fleet, where enlisted people are about 42 percent nonwhite, largely African American and Hispanic.
Following is the process to ensure "diversity". Once you've read it, you tell me how this is Consitutional, let alone moral:
Midshipmen are admitted by two tracks. White applicants out of high school who are not also athletic recruits typically need grades of A and B and minimum SAT scores of 600 on each part for the Board to vote them "qualified." Athletics and leadership also count.
A vote of "qualified" for a white applicant doesn't mean s/he's coming, only that he or she can compete to win the "slate" of up to 10 nominations that (most typically) a Congress(wo)man draws up. That means that nine "qualified" white applicants are rejected. SAT scores below 600 or C grades almost always produce a vote of "not qualified" for white applicants.
Not so for an applicant who self-identifies as one of the minorities who are our "number one priority." For them, another set of rules apply. Their cases are briefed separately to the board, and SAT scores to the mid-500s with quite a few Cs in classes (and no visible athletics or leadership) typically produce a vote of "qualified" for them, with direct admission to Annapolis. They're in, and are given a pro forma nomination to make it legit.]
Minority applicants with scores and grades down to the 300s with Cs and Ds (and no particular leadership or athletics) also come, though after a remedial year at our taxpayer-supported remedial school, the Naval Academy Preparatory School.
By using NAPS as a feeder, we've virtually eliminated all competition for "diverse" candidates: in theory they have to get a C average at NAPS to come to USNA, but this is regularly re-negotiated.
All this is probably unconstitutional. That's what the Supreme Court said about the University of Michigan's two-track admissions in 2003.
Once at Annapolis, "diverse" midshipmen are over-represented in our pre-college classes, in lower-track courses, in mandatory tutoring programs and less challenging majors. Many struggle to master basic concepts. (I teach some of these courses.)
Of course, some minority students are stellar, but they're the exception. Despite being dragged toward the finish line, minorities graduate at about a 10 percent lower rate than the whole class, which of course includes them (so the real split is greater).
That last paragraph may seem a bit "racist" without any analysis, but it makes perfect sense. Minority studetsn have such problems in the class because they shouldn't have been admitted to the school anyway. Since they are admitted (given a different set of criteria) they struggle in the normal classes. Instead of earning (thought qualification) their position, it is given them by default. If only qualified minorities were allowed to enter, their graduation stats would be higher since they can handle the course. This sytem perpetuates itself: minorites graduate at a lesser pecentage of the normal class, the perception is something must be done to get more minorities in the class, not realizing the reason fewer minorities graduate is because they shouldn't be there in the first place! Simply put, unqualified monirities should not be allowed to enter the school, just as unqualified non-minorites. The standards should be the same.
Multi-culti attitudes are destroying the martial atmosphere and traditions of the military. The military is not a playground for social experimentation. What is alarming is this is being done to future military officers. Inculcating the officer corps with this type of crap is going to cost us down the road. These officers will enter the military and will carry this PC garbage with them. It will infect all facets of military life like a plague.
Even more distressing is the attitude is not to have the best and brightest allowed to enter the school. For the sake of "diversity" this process is purposefully admitting underqualified students. Simply put, if a person is underqualified to get into a school, how does this make them qualified, let alone fit, to lead men into combat?
Political correctness will be the death of us all.