Military desperate..

[PaDUer]

Can you imagine how many kids are going to be reading this, emailing, and applying directly from this link to the MILITARY, especially if their family doesn't have the funds to send them to college..They won't even SEE the inside of a college, but will be in their graves!
From the main screen of aol-- AOL Parenting: Princeton Review's Best Colleges--Princeton Review Best 351 Colleges
Based on The Princeton Review ACADEMIC RATING

1 Yale University

2 Princeton University

3 Duke University

4 Amherst College

5 Massachusetts Institute of Technology

6 United States Air Force Academy

7 United States Coast Guard Academy

8 United States Naval Academy

9 United States Military Academy

For the rest of the list--

http://www.princetonreview.com/college/research/rankings/rankingDetails.asp?categoryID=1&topicID=9&adcode=11657

[laconicsax]

1. it's not desperation at all.

It's plain fact. The service acadamies are among the most selective and are top notch academically.

I don't quite understand your dislike of the service acadamies being rated so highly.

It isn't like some kid sees that the USAFA is ranked 6th and just applies--you need to be a near 4.0 student, pass a (pretty easy) physical fitness test, get congressional recommendation, and they clearly state that when you first enter, you go through basic training, and when you graduate, you get commissioned in the Air Force and are obligated to 6 years of service.

[jiacinto]

2. It's because the original poster probably is anti-military

Among a small minority of posters there is complete hostility toward the military. I get angry at the lack of respect for the armed forces I often see here.

[imhotep]

16. Why do you get angry?

its not like you are going to join.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

24. Do something about it, Carlos!

Get down to your local recruiting office post-haste!

Time's a wasting. Don't get angry, get armed and shoot Arab civilians!

[TAH6988]

25. One doesn't

have to serve in the military to take offense at those who are anti-military.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

28. No, but

Military or not, anti-military or not, we can all form our own opinions about said military, whether it makes Carlos angry or not.

Don't ever forget that the military is here to serve the citizenry, not the other way around. And there's no requirement for anyone to pledge fealty to the US military or vow not to criticize them. And if pro-military people don't like it, that's really their own issue to sort out, not mine.

[TAH6988]

29. No, the purpose

of the military is NOT to "serve" the citizenry; its purpose is to defend the nation.

And you are right, everyone has a right to critcize the military when the "military" is wrong.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

30. Actually, you're wrong

Defending the nation IS serving the citizenry. Murdering innocent civilians is not.

And by the way, everyone has the right to criticize the military anytime they want, right, wrong, or indifferent. It doesn't matter. Anyone, citizen or not, can criticize the military anytime they feel like it.

[TAH6988]

31. Your second

state is correct.

Your first is wrong. The military's job is to defend the nation, period. If you say that is serving the citizenry, fine. I read far more into "serving" the citizenry than perhaps you do.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

33. m'kay, thanks. n/t

[tuck]

37. hrm.. not true...

i attended a military academy. (THE military academy, actually...)

small class sizes, yes, but also:

-disaffected profs who care more about football than teaching math
-dumbed-down everything so's the football players can pass
-much higher emphasis on the physical aspects of everything than the academic aspects
-bad bad advising

that's my say.

[TAH6988]

39. Which year did you

graduate

on edit: fixed typo.

[TAH6988]

3. The service academies

already get 8-12 applicants for every opening anyway. It's not easy to get in, and the people who go there (and stick it out for 4 years) have to really want to be there.

[JHB]

4. What's the problem? The Academies?

Having attended (but did not complete) the Naval Academy, I don't see how you draw that conclusion.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

7. Naval Academy, eh?

How'd you like Annapolis, the city I mean?

[TAH6988]

8. AFA grad here

who lives near Annapolis. Except for that one school :-), Annapolis is GREAT.

[Superfly]

5. What's your problem with the academies?

My older brother went to AFA and my younger one went to USMA. I was the "smart" one and went to a state school to get my commission into the Army.

My older brother is a C-130 pilot with over 7,000 flight hours and my younger brother is an professional aeronautical engineer with a famous company in the NE making more money than he can possibly know what to do with.

In retrospect, I wish I had decided to go to one of the academies myself....although I think I had more of a social life.

[ArkDem]

10. Is your older brother in Arkansas?

.

[Superfly]

12. He used to be...now he's in Macon

why? Do you know him?

[lanlady]

6. all I care about--

--is that my alma mater is #1!

:bounce::bounce::bounce::bounce:

BULLDOGS RULE!!!

[theboss]

9. Clearly a new category is needed

"Likelihood of being shot in a gang war." That should take Yale down a few notches and put Princeton in its rightful place.

By the way, despite my Princeton pedigree, I'm not even sure what the first post is trying to say. Does he think students in the Academies are going to be taken out of school and put in combat?

[ScotTissue]

11. I'll put it this way:

Who would you rather have in leadership posts in our military: an officer corps educated in the academically-rigorous service academies or an Ivy League ass like Shrub??

[JHB]

14. That's not as far apart as you might hope...

You can manage to get through either one and still have the narrow mindset of a careerist position-climber. I'll take a guy with empathy & common sense overthe others no matter where they come from.

That said, those Ivy League MBA programs really could use some of the leadership classes I took. The concept of "loyalty down" is a tad rare in corporate America these days (and even in the military, judging from some of the soldiers' complaints from Iraq).

[Shrek]

13. It's not desperation

I went to the Naval Academy and I can tell you firsthand that the education is top-notch.

The only thing inaccurate about that list is the fact that they ranked USAFA ahead of USNA. ;-)

[TAH6988]

15. At least USMA

is below both of them!

[Shrek]

17. Well, of course!

That's just common sense!

;-)

[TAH6988]

18. Sure is...

they got all four of the service academies in the proper order. :-)

[oneighty]

23. This ex-sailor

says: The finest officers I met in the US Navy came from the USNA.

180

[pfitz59]

26. This ex-officer sez:

The scariest Jesus freaks and back-stabbing swine I ever met graduated from USNA!

[TAH6988]

27. Good and Bad

officers come from ALL commissioning sources.

[trogdor]

36. Still, the remark is accurate.

I met quite a few West Pointers who were Jesus-freak backstabbing swine who wouldn't know an original thought if it bit them on the ass.

[TAH6988]

38. And I've met

many who were brilliant atheists. Like I said, both sides of the coin from all sources.

[nedlogg]

19. My father was career military . . .

so I had an automatic appointment to Annapolis if I could pass the entrance requirements.

It just seemed like so much military bullshit, that I passed on the opportunity. Back in my day (1968) it was four years of Naval Academy (no summers off) and then five years in the Navy.

[TAH6988]

20. Sorry to tell you this

But the only automatic appointments to the service academies are to the children of Medal of Honor recpients. It was that way even back in 1968.

[PaDUer]

21. Am anti-military anything...

thanks for what Viet Nam did to my sons father, and our lives. Their father has the medal of honor, purple heart, and several other awards, but, it I still have a bad taste due to what we've all been through. Never in a million yrs would I allow any of my sons anywhere near there.

[TAH6988]

22. Seriously?

A Medal of Honor recipient? I would think your sons are old enough to make their own decisions about joining the military.

[TAH6988]

34. BTW

For what action did he earn the MoH?

[DemLikr]

32. What point are you trying to make?

:shrug:

[TAH6988]

35. I never did

figure that one out.