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THE NAVY program, small (15,400 students in 52 colleges, 387 officer-instructors) but expensive ($11.4 million), is the envy of sister services. The Navy annually gives some 2,000 hand-picked high-school seniors free college tuition plus $50 a month for four years. Under the plan, students must take the four-year N.R.O.T.C. course as part of their academic work, spend three summers on training cruises, three post-college years on active duty as Navy officers. The 600-hour course is tightly organized, highly technical (navigation, gunnery, ship's machinery), and limits nonvocational training to 48 hours of naval history. By trimming other officer-training programs to fit the budget, the Navy has kept its R.O.T.C. on an even keel, gives commissions to all who qualify.
THE MARINE CORPS accepts some 300 Navy R.O.T C. graduates each June, but trains most (1,100) of its college students in draft-exempt platoon-leader classes, commissions them on graduation after two six-week summer-training sessions.
The New Features. On the whole, college administrators welcome R.O.T.C., but many college teachers look down on its service-taught courses. The standardized curriculum makes big demands on memory, but does not encourage independent thought, is often hampered by inexperienced military teachers. Giving up at least one academic course a year for R.O.T.C., the student must listen to many dust-dry lectures on minor military subjects (e.g., field sanitation, personnel accounting) better suited to in-service training. Even the broader courses (the role of air power, political geography) arouse little enthusiasm; the men teaching them are assigned service personnel, not trained historians or geographers. "Many of us," said one University of Washington student, "would be a lot more interested if they modernized R.O.T.C. and took it out of the Eagle Scout class."
With more cadets than it can commission, the Pentagon often seems to shrug off campus criticism of R.O.T C. But both the services and colleges have tried to brighten up the R.O.T.C. Items:
¶Yale University has taken over the teaching of military history and political geography from R.O.T.C., revised both courses and put its own faculty members in charge. Princeton, Ohio Wesleyan, and a handful of others have adopted similar schemes. Main stumbling blocks for most schools: lack of necessary funds and opposition from campus R.O.T C. officers to any change wrought by civilians.
¶The Army has put nearly half its R.O.T.C. units under a new curriculum to produce basically trained officers instead of specialists, giving cadets a chance to pick their specialties after graduation.
¶The Air Force is asking Congress for an appropriation to finance primary flight training for A.F.R.O.T.C. seniors. If the plan is approved, each qualified R.O.T.C. student will get 35 flying hours, enough for a private pilot's license.