How Calls for Increased National Service Further Link Education to the Military

• In Event: Decentering Whiteness and Recentering Equity in Critical Service-Learning

Abstract

National leaders within the federal government, the nonprofit sector, and academia have released three different reports within the past year that call for a significant expansion of national civilian service, including a reinvestment in K-12 and postsecondary service learning. In this study we use political discourse analysis to examine the interests behind the expansion. We find that military goals are intertwined with the aims for increasing national service among youth. We argue that this connection with the military should give pause to social justice educators.

Authors

• Colleen Rost-Banik, University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

• Carmine Perrotti, Providence College