United States of America

Keep the military's base of operations out our education system

As the school year begins, parents and guardians across the [U.S.] are getting to know new teachers, bus routes, routines and worrying increasingly about violence and bullying as we send our children into the semi-unknown. It’s a busy, nervous time of year.

Parents of school-aged children in Syria and Iraq have other worries. An August 2014 United Nations Human Rights Council report states that both state and non-state armed groups in the region have been recruiting children for combat and non-combat support roles in violent conflict, [including] ISIS.

By Charles Davis

April 27, 2014 | 1:45 pm

This article originally appeared on VICE.

The calls started when I was a junior in high school — always in the evening, always after The Simpsons and always with an older gentleman on the other end of the line.

“Charles, there's someone who wants to speak you,” my mother would yell from the kitchen.

She showed no concern as she handed me the phone, no alarm in her eyes over all the calls she was getting from strange middle-aged men looking to chat up her vulnerable teenage son.

That's because these creepers called themselves “colonels” and “sergeants,” which lent authority to their predation. These men were military recruiters — and the bed they wanted to get me in was housed in some barracks.

With so many people active on social media these days, the information obtained simply by listening to the conversations can be invaluable. Many organizations are finding innovative ways to use this data, such as the Army and Air National Guard divisions of the U.S. military.

According to InsuranceNewsNet, the National Guard used social media monitoring to bolster its recruiting efforts.

"We were able to combine traditional recruiting tactics with social media communications by developing a 'social listening' program," said Mike Schaffer, who served as social media director for iostudio, the company that helped craft the Guard's presence within the social media space. "When anyone asked on Twitter about joining the military, for example, we made sure the National Guard was the first branch to respond."