THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 25, 1996 TAG: 9609250394
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: 49 lines
A Portsmouth teen-ager who ``didn't even realize I was messing up my life so bad'' urged federal lawmakers on Tuesday to preserve the military-style educational program she believes has saved her from self-destruction.
``For the first time in my life, I am making straight A's,'' 17-year-old Aimee Northern told members of the House National Security Committee. ``I don't fight with my parents anymore. I always keep everything around me neat and clean, and basically I am just a much happier person.''
Her transformation from a high school junior who was ``failing all my classes . . . skipping school almost every day - even getting into minor trouble with the law,'' is testament to the value of the ``Commonwealth Challenge'' program the Virginia National Guard runs at Camp Pendleton in Virginia Beach, Northern said.
She completed the program, in which students live in barracks under military-style discipline while attending remedial classes, in July. She is now enrolled at Tidewater Community College.
About 70 high school dropouts from across Virginia graduate from Commonwealth Challenge every 22 weeks, all receiving $2,200 stipends for education or additional job training. The $2.4 million per year needed to run the program in Virginia comes from the Defense Department budget.
The Guard runs similar programs in 14 other states, some with state government appropriations supplementing the Pentagon funds. But congressional Republicans, trying to get the military's increasingly scarce dollars focused entirely on warfare, have voted to turn off Challenge's financial spigot by August 1997.
Rep. Owen B. Pickett, a Virginia Beach Democrat, led Northern and Challenge graduates from three other states Tuesday through a gentle series of questions designed to underscore the program's value. Pickett is spearheading efforts to extend the program.
The appeals seemed to win over one GOP stalwart, subcommittee chairman Robert Dornan of California. He's coming around to the idea that programs like Challenge, as well as the military's drug interdiction efforts, are important to national security and thus properly part of the military budget, Dornan said.
But Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., who also has championed a drive to get funds for breast cancer research out of the defense budget, argued that ``somewhere we have to draw the line'' on the use of military funds for nondefense purposes.
Buyer said he doesn't question Challenge's value, ``but you have a Congress here that's struggling on the funding side. . . I want to search for alternatives.'' by CNB