1st Edition

Military High Schools in America

By William B Trousdale Copyright 2007
    488 Pages
    by Routledge

    488 Pages
    by Routledge

    Once considered a bastion of learning, leadership, and disciplined lifestyle, today’s private military academies are often regarded as expensive holding facilities for unwanted, incorrigible boys who have nowhere else to go. Their depiction in popular media has reinforced the impression that they are boot camps disguised as educational institutions. The reality is far more complex and far more encouraging. Using a decade of participant observation research, including serving as an instructor at some of these schools, anthropologist William Trousdale explores the contemporary experience of military school life. From the admissions office to daily life in barracks, classrooms, playing fields, and social events, he describes how these schools endeavor to realize their mission of creating educated, mature young men from largely at-risk youth and the challenges—both met and unmet—in doing so. This volume will be of interest to those studying secondary and alternative education, at-risk youth, and the role of the military in society.

    Introduction; Part 1 The Ethics of Admission: Who, What, Where, Why, When … and How; Chapter 1 The Numbers Game; Chapter 2 Families; Part 2 From Boys to Gentlemen; Chapter 3 The Man and His Gentlemen; Chapter 4 New Lives for Old; Chapter 5 Onward and Usually Upward; Chapter 6 A Sense of Worth; Chapter 7 Old Rusty Nails and Puppy Dogs’ Tails …; Part 3 Watchman, What of the Night?; Chapter 8 Downward toward Disaster; Chapter 9 Man to Man; Chapter 10 Crooked Timber; Chapter 11 Tradition into Tragedy; Chapter 12 Broken Windows; Part 4 Monastery or Magic Kingdom; Chapter 13 Traditional Values vs. Modern Mayhem; Chapter 14 Survival of the Military School; Chapter 15 Suicidal Reinvention; Chapter 16 Cadet Nomenclature; Chapter 17 The Academic Component; Chapter 18 The Curriculum; Chapter 19 The Military Component; Chapter 20 The Athletic Component; Chapter 21 Sanctuary; Part 5 The Change is Forever; Chapter 22 The Change Is Forever;

    Biography

    William B Trousdale