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Raymond Cyrille (SUH-RILL') is a student at Mount Saint Michael High School in the Bronx. The 17-year-old is also an organizer with the Youth Activists Youth Allies Network, or as they call themselves, the Ya-Yas. For the past three years, this small group of youth organizers has worked with other teenagers who try to provide an alternative perspective on military recruitment in their neighborhoods and schools.
SOT: CYRILLE: …ABOUT THE COLLEGE MONEY. A LOT OF PEOPLE DON'T SEE THEIR GUIDANCE COUNSELOR ON A REGULAR BASIS… SEE RECRUITERS FAR MORE THAN THEY SEE THEIR GUIDANCE COUNSELOR…
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Right now the Ya-Yas are planning a spring career fair that they hope will help educate their low-income peers about options after high school. Cyrille says his own conversation with a recruiter helped him understand why some teenagers see military enrollment as a good opportunity.
SOT: CYRILLE: I WAS PROMISED THAT I WOULDN'T SEE COMBAT… AND IF THE MILITARY NEEDS YOU, YOU'RE GOING.
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Cyrille says many of his peers enlist because they don't know how to get financial aid for college based on need. That's where groups such as Brooklyn Parents for Peace come in. On a recent morning, volunteers stood outside John Jay High School in Park Slope, Brooklyn, handing out literature with the words "College Not Combat" in large, graffiti-style lettering.
SOT: HERE YOU ARE, INFO ON HOW TO GET TO COLLEGE WITHOUT THE MILITARY.
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Many of the young people the group spoke to said they don't plan to enlist, and that they've signed the so-called "opt-out" forms prohibiting military recruiters from calling them at home. But sometimes the group's rhetoric doesn't work, like when it's directed at Saykwon a 15-year-old at John Jay.
SOT: …AND DO YOU THINK IT'S WORTH KILLING FOR GEORGE BUSH?.. I LIKE GUNS, I'M SORRY, I LIKE GUNS…
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Some counter-recruitment efforts take a more nuanced approach. Jim Murphy is a veteran of the Vietnam War and an administrator at West Side High School in Manhattan. Two years ago he started New York Veterans Speak Out. Members of the group go to local high schools to talk about their experiences in wars ranging from World War II to Iraq. Murphy says that even though Vietnam can seem like ancient history to teenagers, his story gives context to the films students have seen and the books they've read.
SOT: MURPHY: WE DON'T GO INTO SCHOOLS AS NECESSARILY COUNTER-RECRUITERS…AS SOURCE PEOPLE FOR REAL HISTORY…
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The law gives military recruiters the same access to schools as college recruiters. But Murphy thinks that at high schools where college enrollment is perpetually low, principals give armed forces representatives too much free rein. He points to a high school in the Bronx as an example.
SOT: MURPHY: COLUMBUS HIGH SCHOOL HAS IN EXCESS OF 10 RECRUITERS THERE EVERY DAY…A LOT OF SCHOOLS ALLOW RECRUITERS JUST TO COME IN AND WANDER AROUND…
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Raymond Cyrille, of the Ya-Ya Network, says many of the recruiters who come to his school are alumni. Some of them he remembers as seniors when he was a freshman at Mount Saint Michael. He says those recruiters' built-in "cool-quotient," paired with the military's action-packed television commercials and flashy giveaways make for tough competition. So the Ya-Yas do their outreach armed with goodies of their own.
SOT: CYRILLE:…YOU CAN'T BE ALL YOU CAN BE IF YOU'RE DEAD… KEYCHAIN THAT SAYS, 'MAKE LOVE NOT WAR.'
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But Cyrille isn't sure whether these goodies would work on Saykwon, the John Jay student who's mesmerized by guns, or on young people who see military service as an attractive, long-term career option.
SOT: CYRILLE: SOME PEOPLE HAVE AUNTS AND UNCLES… COMMERCIALS IS NOT REALISTIC AT ALL.
NARR 9: The Ya-Yas and other counter-recruitment efforts will pick up steam next month, as we near the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. I'm Dani McClain, Columbia Radio News.