[Infowarrior] - MD high school for Homeland Security?

[Richard Forno]

Black Ops Jungle: The Academy of Military-Industrial-Complex Studies

By Chris Colin

September/October 2007 Issue

http://www.motherjones.com/news/outfront/2007/09/black-ops-jungle.html

Dedicated to everything from architecture to sports medicine, "career
academies" claim to offer high school kids focus, relevancy, and solid job
prospects. Now add a new kind of program to the list: homeland security
high. In late August, Maryland's Joppatowne High School became the first
school in the country dedicated to churning out would-be Jack Bauers. The 75
students in the Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness magnet program
will study cybersecurity and geospatial intelligence, respond to mock terror
attacks, and receive limited security clearances at the nearby Army chemical
warfare lab.

The new school is funded and guided by a slew of federal, state, and local
agencies, not to mention several defense firms. Officials say it will teach
kids to understand the "new reality," though they hasten to add that the
school isn't focused just on terrorism. School administrators, channeling
Cheneyesque secrecy, refused to be interviewed for this story. But it's no
secret that the program is seen as a model for the rest of the country, with
the Pentagon and other agencies watching closely.

Students will choose one of three specialized tracks: information and
communication technology, criminal justice and law enforcement, or "homeland
security science." David Volrath, executive director of secondary education
for Harford County Public Schools, says the school also hopes to offer
"Arabic or some other nontraditional, Third World-type language."

The school's main goal is to get its grads jobs in the booming
$24-billion-a-year homeland security industry. It's certainly in the right
location: Northeast Maryland has become a mecca for the military-industrial
complex. The Army's Aberdeen Proving Ground is the county's biggest
employer, and all manner of defense contractors have set up shop nearby,
including weapons maker Northrop Grumman.

However, it's not clear how many Joppatowne grads will be on track to join
the upper echelons of the intelligence community and how many will wind up
as airport screeners. "We do want to encourage higher education," Volrath
says. "We also want to be realistic. Some of these defense contractors will
have huge security needs, and the jobs won't require four years of college."

Critics see the school as a troubling landmark: a public school, possibly
the first of many, that is an active participant in the war on terror.
Jonathan Zimmerman, director of New York University's History of Education
Program, says that if it offered students an "intellectually curious"
curriculum, "I'd send my daughter there. But my fear is that they will
instead teach a series of predigested truths about keeping our country
safe."

Volrath maintains that Joppatowne High will remain above the fray. "The
school's built around the marketplace that surrounds the defense industry,"
he explains, "but the program's not involved in war or peace. Still, there
are some realities about good guys and bad guys that will surely be
discussed."