UpDate - Vol. 11, No. 17, Page 9
January 23, 1992
Professor finds military students intense, competitive

     Reclining in a chair in his office, Raymond Callahan,
professor of history and director of the Master of Arts in Liberal
Studies program, smiles as he recalls an incident that occurred in
one of his fall classes.
     "A couple of books, large books, had been casually mentioned
in the course of my first lecture. Several people had gone out and
read them--on top of everything else they had to do," he said.
"They weren't even required readings, and they had some very well-
considered questions to raise about them."
     At the recently established Marine War College in Quantico,
Va, where Callahan is a guest lecturer, such occurrences are
frequent.
     "The officers are very intense, competitive and hard-working
people," he said of the Marines who are chosen to participate in
the programs at the war and staff colleges, where he has been a
guest lecturer for almost five years.
     "They know their performance at the college will affect the
future of their careers. It's a much more intense atmosphere than
you will find on most college campuses," he said.
     Callahan began lecturing at the staff college after he
discussed his field of expertise, as a historian on the military
dimension of British history, with a staff college officer.
     "He felt my interest and the things I could talk about fit
into the curriculum they were building. They invited me down
there," Callahan said.
     The lectures he gives are similar to his classes at Delaware,
and he also conducts smaller seminars. His lectures focus on the
problems of coalition warfare--which is a war that is fought with
one or more allies against a common enemy.
     The staff college is the military equivalent of an academic
master's degree. About 100 officers will attend the intense,
one-year course, usually about 12-15 years into their careers. The
war college is the equivalent of a doctoral degree. Only about a
dozen people are chosen each year to participate in the program.
     Callahan said the classroom atmosphere at the military
colleges is similar to any other military assignment for the
students.
     "They are professional soldiers on duty. Their duty just
happens to be in the classroom that day," he said.
     "They are a challenging and demanding audience."
     He equated the officers to the students in the University's
Master of Arts in Liberal Studies program, where students earn a
graduate degree by taking courses that encompass a broad range of
subjects. "If you say something that is controversial or peaks
their interest, they want to know why you said it. They want to
extract the most out of their time in class."
     Callahan, who began teaching at the University in 1967, has
never been in the military, but he did participate in the ROTC
program as an undergraduate at Georgetown University.
     Having lectured at the Army, Air Force and Marine colleges, he
said he finds the same characteristics among the students at all of
the military schools.
     The students' level of interest in the subject is very high,
he said, because they are studying subjects that are directly
related to their profession. It is possible that some day they may
be involved in a situation identical to the one being discussed in
class.
                                        - Julie Alperen