Stanford ROTC Coverage

• 15 October 1971 Harvard Crimson article "ROTC May Return to Ivy Schools".
• 29 April 1989 Harvard Crimson article "Other Campuses".  Note:  A summary of the status of ROTC at several elite universities.
• 11 October 2001 Stanford Daily article "ROTC mobilizes, but not at Stanford"
• 28 November 2001 Stanford Daily article "The history of Stanford's ROTC opposition".
• January/February 2002 Stanford Magazine "Corps Curriculum".  Comment:  This article illustrates how involving existing faculty members in teaching courses for ROTC credit could address the concerns of those who oppose ROTC course credit over issues of academic content.
• May / June 2002 Stanford Magazine letter "ROTC: A Student's Rebuttal".
• 10 January 2003 Stanford Daily article "Republicans push for ROTC return".
• 17 January 2003 Stanford Daily editorial "ROTC does not live up to University’s standards".  Comment:  The editorial states incorrectly that the rules on gays in the military are "the military’s policy"; actually they are federal law, as documented on Stanford's "Don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue Web site.
• 14 April 2003 Stanford Daily article "ROTC readies military leaders".
• 22 April 2003 Stanford Daily column "Under Bush administration, ROTC is not admirable program" by John Martin.  Comment: A Stanford alumnus argues that ROTC cadets should refuse to fight outside the USA, risking court martial and imprisonment.
• 24 April 2003 Stanford Daily column "Stanford needs ROTC to train leaders, teach discipline" by Jeffrey C. Needham.
• 10 August 2003 Washington Post Op-Ed "Repressing ROTC" by Christina Hoff Sommers.
• 13 May 2005 Stanford Review article "ROTC's Continued Exile Disgraceful".
• 13 May 2005 Stanford Review column "Students Deserve to Have ROTC Back on Campus" by Milton Solorzano.
• 1 June 2005 Stanford Daily article "Students question ROTC policy".  Note:  John Patrick Bennett, a sophomore an ex-Air Force ROTC member, describes how he had to drop out of ROTC because "the three trips a week to San Jose State did not fit into his schedule".
• 27 April 2007 Stanford Review column "Stanford’s Anti-ROTC Policy is Self-Contradictory" by Yishai Kabaker.  Note:  A gay man argues that it is unfair to restrict the rights of students to do ROTC because of the federal "don't ask, don't tell" law, and notes that "ROTC courses like “The Evolution of the United States Air and Space Power,” “Naval Ship Systems” and “Navigation and Naval Operations” are today deemed academically unfit for Stanford while “Chick Flicks and Breakup Songs” receives full credit without question."
• 17 May 2007 The Stanford Daily article "Cadet to White House: ROTC senior will meet president, take oath".  Note:  Stanford student Diana Clough ‘07 will take her oath, "the first time the president has conducted the swearing-in ceremony for ROTC cadets".
• 17 May 2007 Remarks by the President at Joint Reserve Officer Training Corps Commissioning Ceremony.  (Video here)  Note:  President George W. Bush said "All of you have made many sacrifices to receive your commission. Yet some of you have had to endure even greater hardships -- because your universities do not allow ROTC on campus. For those of you in this position, this can require long commutes several times a week to another campus that does offer ROTC, so you can attend a military class, participate in a drill. Most of all, it means living a split existence -- where your life as a cadet or midshipmen is invisible to most of your fellow students.  Every American citizen is entitled to his or her opinion about our military. But surely the concept of diversity is large enough to embrace one of the most diverse institutions in American life. It should not be hard for our great schools of learning to find room to honor the service of men and women who are standing up to defend the freedoms that make the work of our universities possible. To the cadets and midshipmen who are graduating from a college or university that believes ROTC is not worthy of a place on campus, here is my message: Your university may not honor your military service, but the United States of America does. And in this, the people's house, we will always make a place for those who wear the uniform of our country."  Among the officers sworn in at the ceremony were Erik Sand of Harvard, Diana Clough of Stanford and Bret Woellner from Columbia.
• 17 May 2007 Associated Press article "Bush says ROTC has a place on campus".  Note:  "Three of the officers in the White House ceremony came from schools that don't allow ROTC on campus, including Harvard University, Stanford University and Columbia University. Bush saluted their extra sacrifice."
• 17 May 2007 United States American Forces Press Service article "Gates Commissions ROTC Cadets at White House".  Note:  "A change in the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act allows the president, vice president or secretary of defense to administer the oath of commission or enlistment".
• 17 May 2007 United States Department of Defense photos "White House Commissioning Ceremony".  Note:  One of the photos is of U.S. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff with graduating Harvard ROTC student Erik Sand and his mother.  More photos here and here.
• 17 May 2007 Chronicle of Higher Education News Blog item "Bush Assails Colleges That Shun ROTC Units".  Note:  The Chronicle notes that in addition to colleges that ban ROTC there are colleges where there is no ROTC program because the Pentagon concluded that there were "poor prospects of finding good recruits".
• 18 May 2007 The Stanford Daily article "Bush condemns schools without ROTC programs".  Note:  Graduating ROTC student Diana Clough ‘07, who was commissioned at the White House, said that "the President’s speech writers met with her before yesterday’s White House ceremony in the East Room.  “I felt like he was talking about me the entire time, which is really insane"".  Jeff Wachtel, special assistant to Stanford President John Hennessy "said that Hennessy and Prof. William Perry, formerly a U.S. secretary of defense, held a lunch in the fall to honor ROTC students on campus."  "Clough said that the University misses out on “a vital chance to influence the student leaders of tomorrow.” “Stanford is really into producing future leaders in every area, but they don’t include the military, which is interesting considering the times we’re in,” she said".
• 18 May 2007 The Stanford Daily article "Bush honors Stanford cadet at White House: Top ROTC scholar, markswoman becomes an Army Lt.".  Note:  "This year, about 4,000 graduating college seniors will commission into the Army. Clough’s decorated service record and strong performance in drills places her among the top 50 cadets in the country."
• 25 May 2007 The Stanford Daily editorial "Time to rethink ROTC".  Note:  Stanford's student newspaper calls for the university to "rethink its rationale for banning on-campus ROTC programs".  One of the ideas raised is for ROTC to "have access to Stanford facilities in a manner akin to extra-curricular student groups", which does not meet the full requirements of the ROTC Vitalization Act of 1964.
• 29 May 2007 The Stanford Daily article "Azia used Stanford to get ROTC spot".  Note:  A woman masquerading as a Stanford student and squatting in a Stanford dorm forged a Stanford transcript and convinced the Army ROTC program at Santa Clara University to allow her to take ROTC classes.  In the comments on this article "Hooah" notes "If the ROTC program was run on the Stanford campus, the ROTC Cadre would have easily identified Ms. Kim's fraud as they could check enrollment through the registrar -- something they cannot do as a third party without the student's permission, which is the case now."
• 15 January 2008 Federal News Service transcript "The Democratic Debate in Las Vegas".  Note:  Moderator Tim Russert asked "There's a federal statute on the books which says that, if a college or university does not provide space for military recruiters or provide a ROTC program for its students, it can lose its federal funding.  Will you vigorously enforce that statute?" Senator Clinton said "Yes, I will...  I think that everyone should make available an opportunity for a young man or woman to be in ROTC, to be able to join the military and I'm going to do everything I can to support the men and women in the military and their families."  Russert followed-up by asking "Of the top 10 rated schools, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Stanford, they do not have ROTC programs on campus.  Should they?" and Clinton responded "Well, there are ways they can work out fulfilling that obligation. But they should certainly not do anything that either undermines or disrespects the young men and women who wish to pursue a military career."  To the same question about ROTC Senator Obama responded "Yes. One of the striking things, as you travel around the country, you go into rural communities and you see how disproportionally they are carrying the load in this war in Iraq, as well as Afghanistan. And it is not fair. Now, the volunteer Army, I think, is a way for us to maintain excellence."  Senator Edwards also responded affirmatively but switched immediately to discuss veterans' issue.  None of the candidates mentioned the "Don't ask, don't tell" law cited by these universities in banning ROTC. 
• 22 January 2008 Young America's Foundation ad "Bring ROTC back onto Stanford's campus!" in the Stanford Daily.  Note:  The quotes are from the Las Vegas Democratic presidential debate.
• 5 March 2008 Stanford Daily article "Candidates in favor of ROTC on campus".  Note:  In discussing the 15 January comments of presidential candidates about ROTC and the Solomon Amendment, Jeff Wachtel, senior assistant to Stanford President John Hennessy, stressed the difficulty of getting the Pentagon to agree to having ROTC at Stanford because of lack of strong support in the university community: "Any effort to convince the military to bring the program back to Stanford would first need to gain faculty support and then show enough student interest, he said."
• 2 October 2008 Harvard Crimson article "Alumni Org Calls For Return Of ROTC".  Note:  The American Council of Trustees and Alumni sent letters to the governing boards of Harvard, Columbia, Yale, Brown and Stanford calling on them to reconsider their bans on ROTC.  "Paul E. Mawn ’63, the chairman of Advocates for Harvard ROTC and a retired Navy captain, said in an interview yesterday that ACTA “may not understand what the realistic target is” and that the goal should be official recognition" by the Harvard Corporation, "not the opening of a ROTC branch at Harvard.  “The reality is that there are so few students at ROTC anyway, so tomorrow if Harvard begged and pleaded the Pentagon to bring it back on campus, they wouldn’t,” Mawn said. “What has evolved around the country is core sites like MIT that service several different schools. MIT has the critical mass and good facilities and classrooms for the courses and drilling and other activities. There is no critical mass at Harvard.”".  Mawn called upon Harvard to pay the overhead fee for Harvard students taking ROTC courses at MIT, currently paid by the alumni-funded "Friends of Harvard ROTC Trust".
• 29 November 2008 Parade Magazine article "The Fight For ROTC".  The article notes that "Although more than 600 colleges in the U.S. allow ROTC programs on campus, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown, Tufts, Stanford, and the University of Chicago have maintained the bans they began in protest of the Vietnam War...   “The seven schools who exclude ROTC produce many of our leaders, yet their students have the least contact with the military,” says Sean Wilkes (Columbia University ‘06), chair of Advocates for Columbia ROTC. "
• 23 October 2009 Stanford Review article "Students Find Time for ROTC".  Note:  "Regarding the reinstatement of ROTC curriculum at Stanford, [Katie] McCaffree ['12] made the point that more Stanford students would likely give the program more thought if it was more convenient. In response to inquiries as to why Stanford has not reinstated its ROTC program, Vice Provost for Student Affairs(VPSA) Greg Boardman merely stated, “The decision regarding ROTC took place 40 years ago.” "
• 22 January 2010 Stanford Review article "Initiative to Increase Understanding of U.S. Military".  Note:  The Truman Service Initiative aims to educate college students who are likely to become leaders about the nation’s armed forces.  The initiative has programs at Stanford, Columbia, Harvard, the University of Chicago, and Yale.  One subject that came up during a "Military 101" lecture at Stanford was making it easier for students to do ROTC.  "Stanford’s Haas Center for Public Service currently offers monetary support for car rentals to ROTC members, who need to drive to neighboring educational institutions to undergo training".
• 3 March 2009 Stanford University News article "Faculty Senate to meet on Thursday: The senate will hear reports on ROTC at Stanford...".  Note: The Stanford news office provides some historical background to ROTC at Stanford.
• 4 March 2010 Stanford Review blog item "Preview: Faculty Senate takes on ROTC".  Note:  In advance of a faculty senate meeting discussing ROTC, economics professor John Taylor describes why closer relations between Stanford and the military would be good for both.
• 4 March 2010 Stanford Review blog item "Faculty Senate Launches ROTC Exploration".  Note:  The faculty senate voted overwhelmingly to form an ad-hoc committee to "investigate Stanford’s role in preparing students for leadership in the military including potential relations with ROTC".  Proponents argued that the issues of the 1960s were solvable, and reform of "Don't ask, don't tell" would remove the last major stumbling block to closer relations between Stanfard and the military.
• 5 March 2010 Stanford Daily article "Faculty Senate talks ROTC".  Note:  Professor William Perry ‘49 M.S. ‘50, the former U.S. Secretary of Defense, and historian David Kennedy ‘63 argued for restoring ROTC.  "When Perry was discussing the issue with President Hennessy last decade, the controversial policy came up as a roadblock.“We both decided that with ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ it was inappropriate to re-raise the question,” Perry said. But yesterday, Kennedy and Perry expressed confidence in President Obama’s ability to end the policy."
• 5 March 2010 New York Times Bay Area blog item "Stanford Considers Bringing R.O.T.C. Back".  Note:  The history of ROTC leaving Stanford is discussed, complete with a picture of the Navy ROTC building in flames.
• 9 March 2010 San Francisco Chronicle article "Stanford considers bringing ROTC back".  Note:  Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Kennedy, in presenting to the Faculty Senate, warned that by banning ROTC at elite colleges "we are in danger of seriously compromising a 200-year-old tradition in this society of the citizen soldier ... In 2008, the 307 general officers in the United States Army ... had 180 of their children in the service" but by contrast, the 535 members of Congress had only 10 children serving in the military.
• 10 March 2010 Stanford Daily article "ROTC Revisited".  Note:  The article recounts the history of ROTC leaving Stanford in the early 1970s, including the arson that burned the ROTC building to the ground in 1968.  David Harris ’67, one of the leaders of the anti-ROTC movement, summed up his position as “If you believe in the life of the mind, you don’t drop napalm on villages”.
• 5 May 2010 Stanford Daily article "For Stanford ROTC students, early commutes — and perspective".  Note:  In a panel discussion on whether Stanford should allow ROTC on campus, Kassandra Mangosing ’10 described how she needs to wake up at 3:15 AM to get to ROTC at San Jose State University.
• 25 May 2010 The Atlantic column "DADT and Ivy League ROTC" by James Fallows.  Note:  Fallows argues that the "separation between an important military intake system and some of the most elite universities" is "bad for the military, bad for the universities, and bad for the country.  Almost no one urging the anti-ROTC change of those days would have argued or imagined that 35 years after U.S. troops left Vietnam the ban should still be in place."  See responses, but note that the claim that Stanford currently has Army ROTC is not true.