On your average college campus these days, students are busy learning that America was forged in a cauldron of racist genocide, was built on the back of slavery, and continues to this day to be a beacon of evil at home and abroad. Meanwhile, the students go even further when left to their own devices, protesting madly against anyone who might come to campus with a different point of view – even if that point of view is decidedly liberal! You’ve got NFL players kneeling for the national anthem, Democrats calling on historical monuments to be torn down, and half the country calling for the illegal removal of the rightfully-elected President of the United States.
In an environment like that, it’s refreshing to see at least one institution of higher learning take a stand.
That’s what the College of the Ozarks is doing. The Missouri-based Christian college has introduced a new military science class called Patriotic Education and Fitness, and they are making it a required course for all incoming freshmen. Students will be taught the basics of military customs and traditions, learn about U.S. politics, and even get a crash course in rifle marksmanship, all in an effort to invoke in them a spirit of patriotism and respect for the U.S. armed forces.
From Bloomberg:
“I really think that if you give a person the tools of an education, the patriotic yearnings inside of themselves and the leadership tools that can be taught — they will be leaders,” said Terrence Dake, a board of trustees member for the college and retired general with the U.S. Marine Corps.
College President Jerry Davis said he believes “understanding the military now is more important than ever because we have 99 percent of the population being defended by 1 percent, who are in uniform. We should be more intentional about patriotic education, and from our point of view that needs to occur from kindergarten all the way through college.”
The required class builds camaraderie among students, according to Talan Saylor, a freshman at the college.
“We all go through kind of the same thing, so going through a patriotic class where we are learning about our country and fostering a love for that country together is really special,” he said.
We’re sure liberals will see this as a ghastly bit of “indoctrination,” but we find it unbelievably courageous and wise. At least we know there will be at least one crop of leaders graduating college who have been taught to respect the intergenerational gift they’ve been given. Perhaps they’ll be more inclined than most to pass it on, undamaged, to their children.
