Training program offers leadership qualifies
By Jo Griffiths
Discipline, self-confidence, and
leadership are three things all col
leges and universities hope to in
still in their students by gradua
tion day.
Fourteen of Capitol Campus’
students know they’ll be taking
these qualities with them when
they graduate. Why? Because they
practice them every day, seven
days a week, 365 days a year, as
members of the Army ROTC pro
gram here.
ROTC, short for the Reserve
Officers Training Corps, is a na
tional university-based organiza
tion for recruiting and training
future U.S. military officers, and
its doing its job well, according to
Lt. Col. Robert J. Harman, Pro
fessor of Military Science at
Dickinson College, and head in
structor of the Capitol ROTC
program. Acording to a recent ar
ticle in the Wall Street Journal,
enrollment is up 87 percent from
the 1973-74 school year. Nation
wide, a total of 114,451 college
students are enrolled in ROTC,
and 205,949 high school students
are enrolled in the Junior ROTC
program, said the article.
“It’s a place to make your
mistakes now and learn how
to handle them.’*
Major reasons for the growth
cited by ROTC instructors and
the cadets themselves include the
unstable job market, rising tuition
costs, and a more favorable view
of the military in general.
Whatever the reasons people may
have for joining ROTC, the fact
remains that they keep coming.
Darrell Curtis
ROTC cadet
Harman said that active duty
quotas are filling up and that
about 300 cadets in the Army
ROTC program will get reserve
status this year instead of the ac
tive duty status they requested.
“ROTC? It’s a good pro-*
gram,” said Darrell Curtis, a
senior cadet at Capitol. “The
program provides you with
leadership and management op-
portunities you’ll need and use in
a military or civilian career. It’s a
“We all have to accept leadership positions and learn
how to handle ourselves well. In ROTC, you receive
leadership training unlike any elsewhere.”
place to make your mistakes now
and learn how to handle them.”
Other cadets in the program
agree. Sherie Rausch joined for
similiar reasons as did Jim De
myanovich. Noted the latter, “we
all have to accept leadership posi
tions and learn how to handle
ourselves well. In ROTC, you _
receive leadership training unlike
any received elsewhere.”'
ROTC instructors work hard to
instill leadership and dependabili
ty in their cadets, said Harman.
A lot of time and effort is spent
in building confidence in cadets
abilities and self-discipline via a
busy schedule of classroom
work,outdoor drills and physical
conditioning , and more than a
few weekends of still more train
ing. And, that’s all in addition to
the traditional coarse load college
students carry, said Harman.
The time factor has eased a bit,
though, for the Capitol cadets
who used to spend their
Wednesdays driving back and
forth to attend classes at Dickin-
son, the host school. As of last
fall, ROTC classes have been con
ducted right at Capitol, a factor
which has boosted enrollment 70
percent. According to Harman,
“We had two students in the pro
gram before it was moved here.
Now we have 10 juniors and four
seniors, and we expect it to keep
filling.”
ROTC meets every Wednesday
for two hours of classroom in
Jim Demyanovich
ROTC cadet
struction and VA hours of drill
and P.T. (physical training) out
doors. Topics studied include land
navigation, military skills and ad
ministrative procedures, military
intelligence, tactics and weapons,
the different areas of service
within the Army, and officer
enlisted personnel relationships.
Cadets must have a working
The Editorial Staff of TARNHELM,
Capitol Campus Arts Magazine,
cordially invites you to attend the
Reception
of the 1983 TARNHELM Magazine
to be held
Thursday, June second,
Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Three
in the Gallery Lounge of
The Olmsted Building
knowledge of military justice and
ethics.
The focal point of the
classroom and outside training,
however, is the ROTC Advance
Camp which cadets usually attend
the summer between their junior
and senior years. Advance Camp
is six weeks of “basic training” at
Ft. Bragg, N.C., the ROTC’s ver
sion of Officers Basic Training.
Here cadets get a firsthand
chance to put what they’ve learn
ed to good use in a training exer
cise to beat all training exercises.
For some of the Capitol cadets,
though, Advance Camp may be a
sampling, albeit an exaggerated
one, of what life may be like for
the next four years or so. Of the
14 cadets at Capitol, four have
chosen active duty, said Harman,
while nine others have opted for
reserve status. One cadet will be
leaving the program to attend the
Naval Academy.
Cadets have the choice of serv
ing active duty tours or reserve
ones, but must decide which op
tion they want by the end of their
junior year, Harman said. Cadets
choosing active duty generally
serve three or four year tours
while reserve cadets currently are
required to serve eight years.