Recently, State Senator Brice Wiggins (R-District 52) gave a speech in Washington, D.C., promoting the Early Learning Collaborative Act of 2013. This piece of legislation called for the first ever state-funded pre-kindergarten program in Mississippi. I found nothing odd about Wiggins giving this speech, as he is the legislator who pushed the bill through the Senate. However, the company which Wiggins was with struck me as quite peculiar.
Wiggins was joined by a group of retired generals and admirals. This group of distinguished military men represented an organization called Mission: Readiness. According to their website, “Mission: Readiness is (a) nonpartisan national security organization for senior retired military leaders calling for smart investments in America’s children.” The juxtaposition of pre-K and national security potentially has the ability to spark a discourse about the importance of high-quality early education as it pertains to national security that currently does not exist.
The findings of the report, “A Commitment to Pre-Kindergarten is a Commitment to National Security: High Quality Early Childhood Education Saves Billions While Strengthening Our Military and Our Nation,” provide insight that should concurrently be alarming and also viewed as rationale to bolster our early education efforts.
The report cites a Department of Defense statistic that indicates “75 percent of all young Americans are unable to join the military because they are too poorly education, have a serious criminal record, or too overweight.” Furthermore, the report stated, “More than 1 in 5 high school graduates who tried to join the Army could not score highly enough on the military’s entrance exam to be allowed to serve.” Mission: Readiness views high quality pre-kindergarten as a solution to the often interconnectedness of poor education, crime and obesity. I believe the reasoning behind having adequately educated soldiers is simple. The evolution of warfare and the rise of more technologically sophisticated weaponry call for well-educated soldiers.
I found a chart in the report “Human Intelligence: All Humans, All Minds, All the Time” provided by Robert D. Steele, retired Marine Corps infantry solider and intelligence officer, that clearly outlines the growth in the information that needed to be known in warfare. Steele broke it down in generational terms. For example, in first generational warfare we needed to know “where is the (other) army?” Fourth generational warfare we had to “watch every non-state actor.” And in the current generation of warfare we have to incessantly process new information daily and “(be aware of) 183 languages, and put our own strategy, policy, structure, and budget in order.” Frankly, I think it is strikingly clear why we need highly educated soldiers. However, I understand the obstacles that will emerge if we begin actively promoting the lack of high quality pre-kindergarten as a national security. Oh, I can already visualize the political media pundits.
I will conclude by stating that I think the future of conversations regarding the intertwinement of these two issues is promising. Even if the link between national security and pre-K is not as clear or strong as some would argue, what harm can happen from strengthening not only our state’s early education program, but the nation’s? None whatsoever.
Tim Abram is a public policy major from Horn Lake. Follow him on Twitter @Tim_Abram.
