...Unit 6 Project Veterans Having Trouble Finding Jobs After the Military Mark Everhart Kaplan University Professor Sandra Fontana Veterans who have served this country by going to war are quickly realizing that America is not appreciating the sacrifices made for our service members. Veterans are being passed over for employment for many different reasons. Some of these reasons include Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), lack of job skills for performing civilian jobs, and the inability to cope with the transition from military to civilian life. The unemployment rate for veterans is 6.9 percent (Norman, 2012). The government and the employers need to work together to make the transition out of the military a smoother process. The Department of Veteran Affairs cannot process the applications for the G.I. Bill fast enough to accommodate the veterans. Veterans lack the job skills necessary to perform jobs in the civilian sector after the military. All military veterans should have special training, skill and mind set for the transition from military to civilian life, provided by the government and employers to ensure employability after serving their country regardless of how many years of service one has served. Veterans lack the special training and skills that are necessary to compete with the civilian population. Veterans often have jobs that cannot transfer to the civilian world (Hefling, 2011). For instance if they are an infantryman, they cannot get a job as a mechanic....
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...about war veterans we often talk about the battles they fought or the training that they went through. However, this is a very small aspect of veterans military life and experience. There are so much more interesting and fascinating topics to talk about when discussing war veterans. The war veteran I’m researching is John Aguilar. He is a native minnesotan who was a war medic or corpsman during the vietnam war. In this interview and essay, many fascinating aspects of his past military life are talked about including what he did as a medic and his own astonishing war experiences. There are many fascinating things to consider when remembering or discussing military veterans. When remembering vietnam veterans, it is important to consider the effect boot camp has on soldiers, injuries that soldiers have during war, and how veterans are treated by civilians when they come back home. When discussing military related experiences, the effect boot camp has on soldiers is hardly considered or talked about. The following quote from an article on...
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...My Personal Responsibility Essay Jonathan G. Castro Gen/200 September 26, 2012 Mr. Thomas Swan My Personal Responsibility My definition of personal responsibility is the act of taking charge of your own actions and living with the results. Personal Responsibility is putting fear, shame, and struggles aside and doing what you have to do to accomplish your goals. Personal responsibility is the willingness to both accept the importance of standards that society establishes for the individual behavior and to make strenuous personal efforts to live by those standards. Author Haskins (2009) stated, “But personal responsibility also means that when individuals fail to meet expected standards, they do not look around for some factor outside themselves to blame” (para.1). When you thing about it being an American you have the huge responsibility to your country. Obeying the laws of the land like taking care of Mother Nature by not littering or polluting are just some examples. There are other lawful responsibilities as American citizens that we have to abide like “no drinking and driving”. The way society is today most young generations just don’t care about their responsibility and just want to do their own thing. As parents it is our responsibility to raise our kids to follow the right path of life but in reality they need to learn the hard way. They will fall once or twice but they can always get back up. “The demise of personal responsibility occurs when individuals...
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...Adam Tennis Professor Martinez English 101 140531 Writer’s Checklist for Cause and Effect Essay 1. Have I identified the cause or effect I am analyzing in my thesis? 2. Have I explained the cause-and-effect relationship convincingly? 3. Have I organized my causes and/or effects logically? 4. Have I used sound logic? 5. Have I concluded my essay effectively? 6. Have I proofread thoroughly? Adam Tennis Professor Martinez English 101 140531 PTSD: A Battle that lasts beyond the Combat Zone I will be using this paper to highlight some of the cause and effect of a familiar disorder, Post-traumatic stress disorder. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is currently an ongoing issue that many veterans are dealing with after Iraq and Afghanistan and it is something that you live with for the rest of your life. As more and more veterans are being diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder after returning from combat zones it has become a hot topic. This is a disease that lasts long past the combat zone. There has been an extreme amount of research poured into the treatment of this disorder but still little has been yielded for the treatment or even a baseline that causes the disorder. “In recent years there has been a rapidly growing amount of research on the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Our recent metaanalysis suggested that exposure to therapy and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) are among the...
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... The Veterans' Tribute Scholarship is available to 16-18 year old students whose parents or grandparents are U.S. military veterans. This includes active duty, Reserves, and National Guard. Awards are based upon a point system of personal achievement, family involvement in Veterans of Foreign Wars and military service. The award for first place is $10,000, second place is $5,000 and third place receives $3,000. Applicants must submit an entry form, complete a scoring sheet, and provide documents verifying facts related to the entry form. The deadline for this scholarship is December 31st of every year. The Armed Services YMCA Essay Contest is open to the children of members of the uniformed services (active-duty, Reserve, Guard and retired) and civilian (DOD and Coast Guard) families. Applicants must submit a 500-word essay on their favorite book, author, library, why they like to read, their favorite person to read with, etc. Students will be awarded $1,000 bonds for first place, and $200 bonds for second place. In addition, there are two $100 bonds for essays of honorable mention. The Educational Assistance Program of MOAA provides a variety of interest free loans, interest free grants and scholarships to children of the uniformed services. Applications are due in March. The AMVETS National Scholarship for Entering College Freshman is open to the children and grandchildren of AMVETS members. The scholarship requires applicants to write a 50 to 100-word essay on "What...
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...AMERICAN VETERNS DAY -ESSAY There is no greater sacrifice any citizen within this country could incur than to bring your own life under jeopardy for fellow Americans they may never know from, hear from, or be thanked for. It is a heavy burden for this country’s veterans to fight enemies abroad entirely in light of the interest of a nation that is compelled to give power to the people. For many of these brave men and women in uniform, what they do is always taken as contingent upon the government towards the men and woman that are enjoying the gifts of being recognized for who they are, able to speak their mind, and be praised and coveted for staying true to themselves. What many Americans that are tried and true in their service to this country are aware of now is that the liberties and freedoms that constitute their good and bad days were earned by the even worse days that veterans have endured to ensure that their kids and grandkids, as well as their friends, their peers, their lovers, and their kids and grandkids of those who would never care for them to see a brighter future. There really isn’t much of a better way to describe what their ordeals have done for the rest of us. When I started my junior year of high school, our class had a new social studies teacher. Last year, while I was a sophomore, we wished the best of luck to our last social studies teacher as he and his family flew to New York for a better life. As a veteran, fighting in Iraq and losing friends...
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...Essay – Remembering a War We Want to Forget Many US. Soldiers who took part in the Vietnam War experienced that the conflict divided The United States of America. There were two groups, those who went to Vietnam and those who didn’t. It all depended on social class, many men who travelled to Vietnam to fight were the majority of working-class America. Their average age was less than twenty and most of them didn’t even graduate. These young men were not soldiers, but ordinary people. Because they were less privileged than the educated kids, they fought and died in Vietnam, opposite the well educated. For many stationed the war was without any purpose; “ There were no dramatic pushes to the Rhine, no larger missions, nothing to feel a part of” – William Broyles, Veteran from the Vietnam War. Broyles describe how the war seemed meaningless for the soldiers, how 365 days passed with a lot of suffering and lost, how you were leaving when your days were up, but the war went on. The frustrated feeling of powerlessness when new soldiers arrived and were forced to go through the same destructive experience. In this living hell the only thing the soldiers could count on was each other. The Vietnam combat veterans drew this lesson “You are alone, no one else shares your experience or cares about it – no one except your ‘buddies’. Only they matter”. These men’s identities were taking from them when they joined the army, they were putted in a uniform, ordered to remove their hair and...
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...Explication Essay # 1 – “Facing It” Images of war and death can wear on the psyche of anyone and can affect those exposed in vastly different ways. In Yosef Komunyakaa’s poem “Facing It,” the soldier depicted in the poem faces a struggle with images of death and his experiences in combat during the Vietnam War. He grapples with something that we understand today as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD; “Facing It” describes the mind altering events and the subsequent symptoms through the mind of the soldier in the poem. Moreover, as many veterans must do after they return from hell, the soldier faces coping with the memory of others around him that returned home in a flag draped box. The soldier depicted in the poem takes a journey of self-actualization to understand his PTSD, and as he stares at the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, he seeks to understand the reality of his condition by going out on patrol one more time. His final patrol provides a sense of closure and an understanding of his condition over a decade after his experiences in Vietnam. His “black face fades, hiding inside the black granite” (Komunyakaa 1538) as he becomes just one of the many faces of war depicted on the wall. He fights back tears as he is face to face with the wall, and his unresolved memories of pain trigger a flashback of “the boobie trap’s white flash” (Komunyakaa 1539). The resulting white flash kills another soldier named Andrew Johnson in the explosion, and he recounts the day, like...
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...Patriotic Essay Ladies and gentleman, students and teachers, thank you for coming and listening to my speech. Ben Franklin once said, “If you’re not to be forgotten when you’re dead and rotten, either write something worth reading or do something worth writing”. I believe that this means that everyone needs to do something with their life. There are Americans that have lived up to this quote before, like American writers and patriotic individuals, and there were some events in WWII that were also extremely patriotic. Some American writers are overtly loyal in the literature they write. American writers vary from men to women to all colors like Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, and Zora Neale Hurston. Walt Whitman, a civil war veteran, decided to write something worth reading. Whitman’s poems are about his time in the war, and about his remarkable events he had gone through. His writings showed Americans the good and bad times of the Civil War. Walt Whitman died in 1892. Langston Hughes wrote against slavery, and he tried his best to do what he could through his writings. Hughes was first noticed when he published his poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” in 1921. Langston Hughes did write many things worth reading so he also fulfilled the quote that he will never be forgotten even thought he is dead and rotten (died May 22, 1976). Zora Neale Hurston was another great American writer. Her books inspired Americans though out her life to help end slavery. Zora and Langston finished...
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...The Dichotomy of War According to Freud our life is played out in two different, opposing forces. One of them, Eros, is the drive for sex, love, and self-preservation, whereas the other is known as Thanatos, the drive for death and self-destruction. It is the yin and yang of motivations and urges. Put simply, Eros wants us to live and struggle through and with pain and suffering; Thanatos prefers to end it all with death, the equalizer, the dark force, the state of constant peace, calm and rest. My father, a 66 year old retired plumber, is a Vietnam vet seeking treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for the first time in his life. He has two purple hearts and a plethora of mal-adaptive coping skills which have come rather pronounced in his golden years. He lives on a 117 acre ranch in Ellensburg, Washington. His home is off-grid meaning he is not connected to any public utilities and produces his own energy and his home is completely self-sufficient. Most would say this is a remote way of living. Some would say it’s a form of isolation. With all of this privacy at his fingertips, my father still chooses to venture out into the wilderness for days at a time by himself, with his rifle. There is no question in my mind that war gave my father purpose and meaning that is still a part of his identity today but in ways he still doesn’t fully comprehend. As a result of his war experience, he felt pulled in both directions of Eros and Thanatos; the will to survive and the...
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...Garett Reppenhagen the writer of the essay titled, “I was an American sniper and Chris Kyle’s war was not my war,” is trying to make a point to his audience. Garett’s purpose is to ensure that no one makes the mistake of thinking the hit movie The American Sniper depicts what Iraq and the war are all about. This article was first published on Salon, a website that has an audience favoring liberals more than conservatives. This article also has an audience of a younger generation that follows hit movies. Garett Reppenhagen served as a Cavalry Scout Sniper with the 1st Infantry Division in the US Army, and is also a veteran advocate and social justice organizer. Garett’s background has a lot of relevance to this topic. I would say he is credible towards this whole subject. He is qualified to make judgment and criticize the way this movie is trying to depict Iraq. Garett’s extrinsic ethos is that he has served in the military. He has made a profession of being a real life sniper so he knows most of the scenarios that go on in the movie. He could also describe what goes on as you enter a war zone and how each and every person reacts. Garett states, "But viewing the war only through his eyes gives us too narrow frame." I believe this quote shows he cares about the audience because he wants to share that the frame of Iraq is not narrow, in fact it is on the contrary. Iraq is full of hospitality, proud history, and old-soul wisdom. This quote also shows virtue and goodness because he...
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...A Brief History of "Outlaw" Motorcycle Clubs Little scholarly research exists which addresses outlaw motorcycle clubs. These works attempt to explore warring factions of outlaw clubs, provide club members’ perspectives about media portrayal, expose myths, and elucidate motorcycle club culture.*1 The literature reveals gaps which leave many unanswered questions: Where do outlaw motorcycle clubs come from? How did they start? How or why did they evolve into alleged international crime organizations? The few histories of outlaw motorcycle organizations date the origins of such clubs to around 1947 and tend to oversimplify the issues of why these clubs formed and who actually joined them. Histories such as these are built on foundations of weak evidence, rendering inconsequential the origins of the subculture and relegating members of early organizations to the marginal status of “malcontents on the edge of society, and other antisocial types who just wanted to raise hell” (Valentine 147). This article extends current research by reaching back nearly half a century before 1947 to link the dawn of motorcycle organizations with the present reality of outlaw motorcycle clubs. The overarching goal of the article is to offer a more comprehensive history, an evolutionary history that may allow for a better understanding of contemporary motorcycle subculture. What follows is a taxonomy of social and historical factors affecting group formation of motorcycle clubs according to the...
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...Sam Grudzien The Civil War to Modern America The Searchers Reflection Essay Tom Ford’s The Searchers is a Western film starring John Wayne who plays Ethan Edwards, a Civil War veteran, and spends the film on a search for his niece Debbie who was abducted by a Native American tribe called the Comanche. On his search, Wayne is accompanied by Jeffrey Hunter, who plays as Edwards’ nephew Martin Pawley. The two men search for five years before finding Debbie. Throughout the movie we learn as viewers that Ethan is a racist man and shows no respect towards Native Americans. We also find out that even though he has devoted five years of his life searching for Debbie, his plan is to murder her simply because he would rather see her dead than living as an Indian. John Wayne plays the role of Ethan Edwards in the film The Searchers and his character is a Western hero, but not a typical Western hero. Ethan is a hate-driven, racist outlaw and a loner with no wife or children. In the beginning of the film Ethan rides up to his brother’s home and has no explanation of where he has been or what he has been doing. He does whatever he wants and doesn’t care to let anyone know. Ethan also shows some anti-social behaviors during the funeral scene. While everyone is mourning the deaths of Ethan’s brother Aaron and his family, Ethan is eager to begin the hunt for the Native Americans. He ends the funeral by saying “Put an amen to it. There’s no more time for praying. Amen”. Ethan is not...
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...Studies Program at Williams College. He studied at Yale University (Ph.D., M.Phil., M.A.) and College of William and Mary (B.A.). Specializing in the history of the American Revolution, Presidents and the roots of American foreign policy. His works include American Sphinx, His Excellency: George Washington and Revolutionary Summer: The Birth of American Independence. As well as essays and book reviews that appear in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, The New Republic, and The New Yorker. Founding Brothers is a Pulitzer Prize winning book that discusses the prominent men in the political atmosphere of America after the Constitutional Convention and the issues that they faced. The book starts off with the infamous duel between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton on July 11, 1804. The outcome of this duel is that Burr shoots Hamilton and...
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...Ingersoll was born on September 13th 1775 in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Laura never recognized the true meaning of a lighthearted childhood. At the age of eight her biological mother, Elizabeth Dewey, passed away leaving her to look after her three younger sisters. This was difficult seeing as her father, Thomas Ingersoll, was an American Officer and constantly beckoned for duty. Her father married twice and had numerous children for which Laura helped care for. In 1795 her father grew to dislike the American government and decided to move the entire family to Upper Canada. When Laura was eighteen the family moved to Bustling Port which was near the Niagara River. After Laura relocated she met a young man named James Secord who she eventually married in 1797 under the Church of England. They were a very wealthy family. By 1812, the Secord’s had five children and moved to Queenston. Laura did not pursue a career but James was a very successful merchant. Laura and James lived a life full of happiness. Early in the War of 1812, her husband James was a solider in the 1st Lincoln military that was injured in the battle of Queenston Heights and was rescued by Laura. The following summer, when Niagara peninsula was most vulnerable for the Americans, Laura overheard on June...
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