Military Review English Edition July-August 2015 | Page 24
creativity, and innovation. Our world-class universities
incubated this spirit. Today, the United States has the preeminent graduate-level education programs in the world.4
Its graduate schools are widely considered the destination
of choice for foreign students able to study abroad.5
The U.S. advantage in higher education is not an
accident of history. Other advanced nations abound
with intelligent and dedicated critical thinkers as well as
excellent schools of higher learning. However, our advantage stems from a U.S. higher education system that
is built upon a proven model: the state university system.
While there are many variants, this system organizes the
academic efforts of each state into specialized centers of
scholarly excellence. This collective approach produces
a rate of innovation that is difficult to achieve in smaller,
stand-alone programs. Consequently, the state university
system produces high-quality critical and creative thinkers at a pace that makes it the envy of the world. Our
goal is to apply this proven civilian model to the military
education system to produce the agile and adaptive leaders required by the U.S. Army Operating Concept.
Why Now
There are two reasons we should act now. First, education is the most reliable strategic hedge in investment
that the Army can make in the face of an uncertain future. In July 2014, the secretary of the Army called for
a comprehensive strategy, oriented on the time frame
of 2025 and beyond, which would “adapt the Army to
a rapidly changing global security environment that
is volatile, unstable, and increasingly threatening to
U.S. interests.”6 Central to this strategy is recognition
that the Army will require expert critical and creative
thinkers to serve as innovative leaders who thrive in
uncertainty and chaos.7 Those with the potential to
become such leaders are already part of our Army
today. Consequently, adequately training leaders for the
future must begin immediately.
Second, history reveals that some of the best and
longest-lasting transformations in military education occur in the