Armed Services vocational aptitude battery (asvab) test
- Check out our ASVAB factsheet
- What questions you should be asking if ASVAB is offered in your school
Schools are required to administer at least 2 career aptitude tests to students. The Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) Test, is often used to help fulfill this requirement, despite the fact that it is a part of the military entrance exam process. It is not a test that explores the interests of a student, but quantifies whata youth already knows and how that corresponds to expectations for different military career, with little or no correlation to civilian careers, making it an ineffective test for the majority of students who will not be going into the military. The reason many schools offer it is because the Pentagon gives and administers the test at no charge to schools, but there is no such thing as a free lunch, and students must put all their contact info and sign the cover of the test – releasing their information to the military and local recruiters – in order for it to be processed and scored. The answers are then turned over and processed, with the info given to local recruiters so that they can use the results to target students.
Schools have eight options on what happens to the data and information collected during the test, by selecting ‘Option 8’ a school can prevent the results from being distributed to anyone but the school, meaning that it will not go to the recruiters. Most school administrators are unaware of this choice, and the default option shares the students’ information with the military and recruiters. You can start with talking to your counselors and principle to get the scoop, ask them to choose ‘Option 8’ and from there push them to offer a test that has value to students rather than just military recruiters.
If your school still offers the ASVAB and does not choose ‘Option 8’ then refuse to take the test and work with others in your school to boycott it and pressure administrators to find another test; they can require you to take a career test, but nothing in the law states that it must be the ASVAB. Educate other students, parents, teachers and administrators on what the ASVAB is and the information that it provides to recruiters to build pressure to change school policies on giving the test, like these students in Georgia.
