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Why Education Matters – Part II

Vince Patton, Ed.D.
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard, USCG Retired

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” – Nelson Mandela

Part II of a three part series

As we approach the chief radioman’s stateroom, Flanagan (Scott’s his first name, but everyone called each other by their last name that few of us ever knew what the first name was) gave me a quick revised ‘how to report aboard’ line, and told me with all sincerity, “forget what they taught you in RM school – this is how it’s done out here in the REAL COAST GUARD.” So, all I had to do was just say to the chief, “I’m Patton, your new radioman reporting aboard.” So – I knocked on the chief’s stateroom door, and about a second after the knock, I hear this gravelling yell, “WHAT DUH YA WANT!” in a rather southern-type drawl. I repeated what Flanagan told me to say. It was rather interesting that after hearing the yell from the other side of the door, Flanagan sort of ‘takes off’ at Mach speed. The stateroom door opens, I get a quick split second glance of the chief, and immediately the door is slammed in my face.

Okay – what happened here? Did I screw up by listening to Flanagan giving my reporting aboard speech a little too casual instead of the smart military bearing way I was taught in Radioman School? Or, perhaps the door slipped out the chief’s hand and it closed by itself? After pausing for a few seconds to figure this out, I figured I’d try the knock again, but this time with the line I was taught in Radioman School on how to properly report aboard. As I do a three tap knock, the door opens again, and I start with, “SEAMAN RADIOMAN PA…” never got to even finish my name, and the chief interrupts me with a sourly look of disgust and said, “SCRATCH IT! Not interested in who you are or what you’re here for. I didn’t ask for any niggers to be in my radio room. So, just high-tail your black ass out of here and go see the chief cook. You can work for him along with the rest of you colored boys.”

Let’s do a recap – the year is 1973, February 18th to be exact. I am in the United States, in the city of New York, on a U.S. military installation called Governors Island, and aboard a U.S. Coast Guard vessel called the United States Coast Guard Cutter Dallas. This can’t be a dream, and I’m not watching a movie about the troubled South back in the times of the civil rights struggles.

Unfortunately – this unfortunate situation happened. While it was 40 years ago, this incident is a vivid to me as if it happened yesterday. So – why am I telling you this, and what does it have to do with education? Believe it or not – this despicable matter became the foundation of starting my academic climb.

There’s more to this story of course, but to cut to the chase and to bring to full circle about education, not to mention more importantly the correlation to Nelson Mandela’s quote, is I got angry when my chief first called me the unthinkable racial slur. To fast forward after that first meeting with him, I was of course assigned to the radio room team on the DALLAS, thanks in part to my communications officer who I credit as my first mentor in the Coast Guard.

What happened was my communications officer (a Lieutenant, who himself ended up with a stellar career retiring as a Vice Admiral), was the one who pushed me into working on my education. While the chief radioman didn’t much care for me to be in HIS radio room, he stewed through the process and the threat of being put on report for his racist discriminating behavior reluctantly stood by while I began working in my specialty on DALLAS. It wasn’t without incident mind. He would find ways to dig at me, calling me “stupid,” “ignorant,” or just about any other connotation that substituted the ‘N’ word. My communications officer was my guardian out of all of this.

Back in the early 70s, the Coast Guard cutters participated in weather patrols called ‘Ocean Stations.’ The cutters would patrol certain quadrants in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans for about 40-45 days at a time. In the North Atlantic for example we provided weather forecasts for merchant vessels, transoceanic air flights, plotted icebergs, and pretty much functioned like a floating ‘Triple-A’ station, ready to handle any call when needed.

Oftentimes, these patrols were boring, so many of the enlisted crewmembers took college courses while underway through a correspondence course program known as the U.S. Armed Forces Institute, or ‘USAFI’ (pronounced “U-SAU-FEE”). The USAFI (now renamed Servicemembers Opportunity College or ‘SOC’) allowed servicemembers to work on college education programs through a consortium of several dozen colleges and universities. It ‘protected’ your college credits if you desired to continue on with your degree by enrolling in one of the USAFI-member schools. The neat thing was the USAFI courses were free of charge. You could take an English 101 course from the University of Wisconsin and a Psychology course from University of Michigan. Once you finished your courses and eventually enrolled into let’s say University of Illinois as a fulltime student, the completed courses you took through USAFI would be transferred to Illinois as if you took the classes there, because all three of these schools were under USAFI. The other neat thing about USAFI, if you took any of the College Level Examination Program (CLEP) tests, they too would be incorporated into a college transcript of the college you have identified as your ‘Home’ school. This is the school you have designated to track your credits.

Read Part III of Why Education Matters by Vince Patton, Ed.D.
About the Author
A native of Detroit, Michigan, Patton retired from the U.S. Coast Guard 1 November 2002, after serving 30 years of active duty. He became the first African American selected as the service’s senior-most enlisted ranking position as the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard in 1998. His career included staff and operational assignments both afloat and ashore throughout the United States, and a joint military service assignment in Cuba and Haiti.

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