Option 8: Protect your students from ASVAB Print E-mail

ASVAB, one of the longest acronyms in public education, stands for giving your students names, phone numbers, addresses, and career profiles to the Pentagon for military recruitment and inclusion in one of the largest databases on youth ever created. Protect your students with OPTION 8.

ASVAB stands for the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. It is a test that is provided to school districts as a career-placement test that helps indecisive students claim their place in the great American economy. The ASVAB tests students in different areas using a friendly color-coded vector, shaping, as it goes along in a multiple-choice coded pattern, a categorization of the student into eight broad areas. After the test is complete, and the multiple-choice responses tabulated, the student receives a designation geared to an existing job in the US military machine. Military recruiters then use student information from the test, including the scores and profiles, and private contact information, to contact the student and encourage them to join the military using high-pressure sales tactics.

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There is a quite a market for ASVAB and ASVAB related products. From ASVAB for Dummies to private tutoring programs and test-taking ‘skills’ workshops. Currently, 34 states across the nation require all juniors to take the ASVAB for military career placement today. This amounts to around 1.3 million high school students tested each year nationally.

The information gleaned from the test is funneled into a database and rests securely in the Pentagon until a military recruiter pulls up the students name. This is the largest database on youth ever created in America. The Pentagon has stated they will use this information for military recruiting for two years, and then maintain the list indefinitely.

Here is what you can do:

  • 1. Find out if your local high school and school district give the ASVAB to juniors.
  • 2. Inform them that there is an option in the test itself which keeps student information private. This is called Option 8 in the ASVAB test reporting options. Demand that your school and district protect student privacy from military recruiters and the Pentagon database by selecting Option 8. The whole school district can do this.
  • 3. Let them know that the CFT passed a 2008 resolution calling on schools to implement Option 8 for all ASVAB testing. Many school districts across the state and nation are already doing this. Is your District one of them?
  • View Resolution 31, page 40

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For more information contact Gregory Sotir, AFT 1021/UTLA at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 310-467-8053.

Gregory Sotir is an eighth grade English teacher at Virgil Middle School, LAUSD, and an organizer for CAMS, the Coalition For Alternatives to Militarism In Our Schools.

Go to website of Military Free Schools for more info.