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While women have been present on battlefields through history, their roles have expanded considerably in recent decades. The lifting of remaining restrictions fits into the pattern of expansion ove...

The U.S. Army's outreach and recruiting efforts now encompass social media platforms. As part of these efforts, the Army Marketing and Research Group uses its website (GoArmy.com) and social media (Facebook and Twitter). The authors analyzed these efforts to understand if and how potential recruits and others are engaging with content and offer recommendations related to the Army's technology-based outreach efforts.

In 2010, Congress reauthorized the Post-9/11 GI Bill by changing reimbursement rates from widely-varying by-state maximums to a nationwide limit. This policy created exogenous variation in the changes in reimbursement rates in direction and magnitude for veterans at private universities. We leverage this variation to examine for-profit college responses to changes in reimbursement rates. We detect tuition responses only for for-profit colleges, where we estimate a one percent pass-through rate. This for- profit response is driven by colleges in states that saw decreased benefits, colleges with higher concentrations of veterans, and colleges whose pre-change tuition was above the state maximum but below the since-increased nationwide level; the last group has a pass-through rate of eight percent. This policy also caused declines in non-veteran populations showing a substitution towards veteran students.

My Career Advancement Account Scholarships are intended to help military spouses with education and employment. The percentage of eligible spouses working declined over time, but users were more likely than nonusers to be working two years later.

Previous research finds negative effects in the short and medium term for those who initially entered the labor force during weak labor markets. Discerning the effects of initial market conditions is difficult as young workers may attempt to time their entry by, for example, spending additional time in school during weak markets. In this paper, we take advantage of a novel form of exogenous variation that affected a large group of older workers to study longer-term effects of entering labor markets during bad economic times. Using the Health and Retirement Study, we focus on veterans from the draft era and examine the effects of leaving military service during periods of high unemployment on earnings, wealth, and retirement. These men had little choice about the timing of entry into the labor force; they generally were drafted or volunteered based on world events, and they left the military at the end of fixed contracts after short terms of service. Our results indicate that draft-era veterans who entered the labor force during a weaker economy had lower levels of earnings, and the effects lasted for more than a decade. We also find that while veterans who enter weak labor markets eventually catch up with other veterans in terms of earnings, the accumulated negative effects on wealth and financial preparedness for retirement are large; we find some evidence that veterans compensate by extending their working lives.

U.S. Army military intelligence analysts work in increasingly complex and dynamic operational environments requiring intangible competencies, such as critical thinking and adaptability. This report describes the development and implementation of a process to assess key analytic competencies and proficiency of the U.S. Army's analysts in the 35F military occupational specialty and the design of a protocol for ongoing evaluation.

An examination of past analyses suggests that today's sailors may be less responsive to compensation changes than previous generations. Such a change could make recruiting and retaining high‐quality sailors more difficult. However, variation in researchers' decisions over time may simply have created the appearance of such a change. Our results suggest there is little variation in the pay elasticity over time. In contrast, the different reduced‐form models we use to measure this relationship can explain most of the variation in the literature. Therefore, the evidence suggests that while sailors may have changed over time, their response to compensation has not.

The Marine Corps Combat Development Command asked RAND to study the integration of women into infantry combat roles. Researchers reviewed the literature, conducted interviews, estimated costs, and developed an approach for monitoring integration.

JENNIE W. WENGER [*] This article introduces the hypothesis that secondary schools create at least two competing "outputs"--standardized test scores and high school completion--which may be seen as substitutes. This hypothesis provides an explanation for the decrease in standardized test scores that occurred over the last 40 years along with an often overlooked increase in high school graduation rates. The article presents evidence supporting this hypothesis as well as evidence that different schools face different tradeoffs and discusses the policy implications of such trade-offs. (JEL I21, J24) I. INTRODUCTION Public education in the United States over the last 40 years has been characterized by dramatically increased real spending coupled with falling test scores. [1] Naturally, the coexistence of these two trends has sparked considerable interest and concern. Many researchers view this combination as evidence of inefficiencies, and such inefficiencies certainly may exist. However, another important trend characterizes this time period--high school graduation rates increased dramatically. The percentage of the population having graduated from high school increased nearly 50% between 1960 and 1993 (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1994, p. 157). The high school dropout rate, defined as the percentage of those between the ages of 25 and 29 with neither a high school diploma nor a GED, decreased by more than 50% between 1960 and 1975 (Jencks, 1992, p. 174); the high school dropout rate continued to fall until 1987 and has remained relatively stationary since that time (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1993, table A-4). [2] At l east one account shows that SAT scores have changed very little over the last 30 years after correcting for class rank--scores for students in each quartile have been stable, but as more students from lower quartiles took the test, the average score fell (Berliner and Biddle, 1995, p. 21). This research hypothesizes that falling test scores and increasing high school completion rates are directly connected--that, in fact, schools face a trade-off between test scores and graduation rates. Thus, we would expect that rapidly increasing graduation rates should be accompanied by falling test scores. In this case, graduation rates and test scores may be thought of as distinct, separate "products" of schools. Thus, schools using resources to increase graduation rates may be forced to accept a reduction in test scores. Initially this is counterintuitive; most people think of "good" schools as those producing high test scores and high graduation rates. Also, high test scores increase an individual student's probability of graduation. However, consider the school as the decision-making unit. Beyond a certain point, schools may be able to increase graduation rates only by accepting lower test scores (the students retained to increase graduation rates may lower average test scores), and may be able to increase test scores only by accepting lower graduation rates (allowing those students with the lowest test scores to drop out). The same argument holds if marginal students decide to stay in school due to increased returns to education. Simply put, test scores and completion rates may be substitutes rather than complements. [3] A negative correlation between graduation rates and test scores provides some evidence of the trade-off between high school graduation rates and test scores. Table 1 uses data from the High School and Beyond (HS & B) survey (discussed in Section III) to show that the percentage of students completing high school is positively correlated with both the initial standardized test score and the standardized test score given during the first follow-up. In contrast, the percentage of students completing high school is negatively correlated with the gain in the standardized test score. This last measure is consistent with schools trading off gain test scores for graduation rates; however, this result could also be explained by a ceiling effect on the standardized test included in the HS & B data set. …

While many sailors still join the Navy with a 4-year enlistment contract, longer contracts have become more common. Especially before the recent recession, the Navy offered enlistment bonuses to sailors who agreed to an additional year of obligation. Because 4-year contracts often expire before a sailor completes an initial sea tour, lengthening first-term contracts offers the potential to improve alignment and thus increase the number of completed sea tours among this group. We examine data on applicants and enlistees from 2003 forward. We split our data into 2 periods based on civilian conditions. While we do not model the detailing process explicitly, our reduced-form models suggest the applicants are relatively insensitive to obligation length; regardless of civilian conditions, the availability of longer/shorter terms has little explanatory power over the decision to enlist. Consistent with this, we fined that obligation length has little relationship to first-term attrition. These findings, coupled with the relatively modest cost of increasing obligations through initial bonuses, suggest that gains from increasing initial obligations to align with sea tours could be considerable. However, a well-designed pilot program will allow the Navy to make a more accurate assessment of the benefits and costs of increasing contract length.

Traditionally, the Navy has set sailors initial contract lengths to ensure a return on investment (ROI) from sailors training. The current mix of 4-, 5-, and 6-year Navy enlistment contracts is partially a result of this ROI framework. However, this approach is not necessarily aligned with the sea-shore flow. We find that many sailors end of active obligated service (EAOS) comes before the end of their first prescribed sea tour (PST), which follows training. Because those sailors whose EAOS doesn't cover their PST complete their PSTs at much lower rates, we conclude that aligning PST and EAOS by increasing initial obligation would increase overall sea tour completion rates. The T+X pilot does exactly that for several ratings. The program started in 2011, so our data on its participants are fairly recent. Nevertheless, with the caveat that our analysis is based on a small sample over a short period of time, we find that, so far, there is no evidence that lengthening obligations for T+X sailors has changed recruit composition or early attrition rates. Based on these findings, we present simplified estimates of cost savings resulting from lengthening obligations in T+X ratings. These savings range from $7.35 million to $11.67 million per year, depending on economic conditions. Finally, we discuss the shortcomings of the data on enlistment incentives and the ways it prevents us from precisely identifying the cost of extra commitment from recruits. We also suggest ideas for future pilot programs, including several randomized experiments, which would help fill the current data gaps.

In recent years, the number of people age 19 or younger who earn General Education Development (GED) certificates rather than high school diplomas has increased appreciably. At the same time, states have substantially increased requirements for high school graduation. The two primary paths for tightening graduation requirements are implementing exit exams and increasing the Carnegie-unit requirements. Exit exams are standardized tests that students must pass (in addition to completing course work) to receive diplomas; Carnegie-unit requirements specify the number and type of courses that students must pass to graduate. Both of these changes have the potential to make recruiting more difficult for DoD. Those who graduate with GEDs rather than traditional high school diplomas enter the Services with a Tier 2 credential. The total proportion of accessions with Tier 2 or 3 credentials is limited by DoD and the Services. In addition, those who lack Tier 1 credentials are not eligible for some fields/bonuses and must score higher on the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) than traditional high school graduates. For these reasons, an increase in the proportion of young people with GEDs essentially reduces the pool of potential recruits with preferred credentials. In this research, we use data from the 2000 Census to examine how changes in GED recipiency, the use of high school exit exams, and increasing Carnegie requirements affect the size and quality of the pool of potential enlisted applicants of the Navy and the Marine Corps. We next examine how these changes in education requirements affect the proportion who enter the Services with alternate credentials (no high school diploma). Finally, we look at how education policies affect the quality and performance of those who are accepted for enlistment.

The Conference Report of the National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 1999 directed the establishment of a 5-year pilot program requiring the military Services to treat graduates of homeschools, and graduates of the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe program who possess a GED, as Tier 1 for enlistment eligibility purposes. This study evaluates how these recruits compare with other recruits. Because of the substantial cost of replacing recruits who do not fulfill their enlistment obligation, attrition rates serve as our primary outcome measure; however we also examine other measures including initial aptitude, initial paygrade, type of discharge, presence of waivers, and reason for separation. We find that both homeschooled and ChalleNGe GED recruits have much higher attrition rates than traditional high school graduates. Our findings on other measures match up with our attrition findings; homeschooled and ChalleNGe GED recruits are not strong recruits by these measures either.

An understanding of the relationship between changes in compensation and changes in reenlistment behavior is crucial to shaping the force. A common measure of this relationship is the pay elasticity of reenlistment, the percentage change in reenlistment associated with a 1-percent increase in pay. The literature on Navy enlisted personnel has produced widely varying estimates of this relationship; with changes in both analytic approach and in the Sailors being studied, the reasons for these differences are unclear. Our analysis suggests that most of the variation in these estimates can be explained by the use of different analytic models. Different specifications yield different estimates that span the range found in previous research. Because each specification uses the same data, these different estimates reflect differences in the degree to which these models attribute differences to pay, not differences in the behavior of enlisted personnel. In contrast, there is little variation in the pay elasticity over time; the only significant changes occur during the drawdown. We choose a preferred specification by examining its ability to accurately predict reenlistment behavior. For both in-sample and out-of-sample predictions of reenlistment, our baseline model, with a pay elasticity of 1.5, provides the best fit of the data.

The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999 directed a 5-year pilot program to treat graduates of home schools and graduates of the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program holding General Education Development (GED) diplomas as Tier 1 for enlistment eligibility purposes. The Department of Defense (DOD) classifies enlisted accessions into three tiers based on education credentials. Tier 1 recruits are primarily high school diploma graduates (HSDGs), Tier 2 recruits are primarily GEDs, and Tier 3 recruits are high school dropouts. Enlistment tiers are intended to reflect attrition patterns Tier 1 having the lowest attrition. DOD standards require that at least 90 percent of accessions be Tier 1. Recruits in Tiers 2 and 3 must score at or above the 50th percentile on the Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT). This study seeks to satisfy a congressional requirement for DOD to evaluate the performance of home school graduates and ChalleNGe graduates with GEDs and recommend their permanent tier status. The Directorate for Accession Policy, Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Force Management Policy) asked CNA to assess the early separation rates and interest in military service of these two groups of recruits and to identify effective ways to reach out to them.The size of the home school student population in the United States was approximately 800,000 during the 1999-2000 school year (about 2 percent of the K 12 population). In recent years, the number of home schoolers has grown by at least 7 percent per year. Common reasons for home schooling are dissatisfaction with the local schools and promotion of religious values. Home schoolers have strong academic achievement.