Faced with dwindling prospects for meeting its recruiting targets, the U.S. Army is reaching out to a bigger set of enlistees, in more than one sense of the word.
Taking a page from "The Biggest Loser," the hit TV show where contestants compete to shed pounds, Army officials have adopted a waiver program that gives overweight enlistees a chance to get in shape after joining.
The Army and other service branches have relied on waiver programs --- essentially, workarounds to the traditional admission standards --- to meet recruiting targets as ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue to strain the military. OhMyGov! reported in September on another Army waiver program targeting enlistees who lacked a high school diploma or GED certificate. The Army had previously required a high school equivalency to join; with the waiver, qualifying enlistees joined a training batallion and had one month to earn their GED.
The weight waiver appears to have beefy football-player types in mind, not the flabbiest of couch potatoes. The Army considers recruits' body-mass index (BMI), which estimates
body fat based on weight and height. Under the waiver, recruits would have one year in which to meet the Army's physical requirements.
"We support any service who comes up with a scientifically defensible
way of expanding the market (of recruits)," Curtis Gilroy, director of
accessions policy for the Pentagon, told the Christian Science Monitor, which first reported on the waiver program.
Recruits still have to complete a battery of tests, including push-ups (not the popsicle variety) and a "step test," before being admitted.
The program so far has been effective, with attrition rates of those admitted via the waiver no higher than others, according to the Army Recruiting Command. Most of the enlistees, in other words -- both men and women -- are shaping up before shipping out.
An army of one ... and then some
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