Q&A: Brigadier General Melvin G. Spiese
Written by Christian Sheehy
Preparing Marines for Greater Responsiblity Through Educational Opportunity
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Brigadier General Melvin G. Spiese
Commanding General,
U.S. Marine Corps Training and
Education Command
Leaving Illinois in June 1986, Spiese was posted to Headquarters Marine Corps, serving as the head of Regular Officer Procurement. Following his tour at Headquarters, he attended Marine Corps Command and Staff College, graduating in May 1990. After graduation, he was transferred to Marine Corps Air Station, Iwakuni, Japan, and assigned to Marine Aircraft Group 12 as the assistant operations officer and ground combat liaison. Spiese was assigned to 6th Marines in July 1991 as the executive officer of 3rd Battalion, then regiment S-3. He assumed command of 2nd Force Reconnaissance Company in December 1993. Upon relinquishing command in July 1995, Spiese was reassigned to U.S. Special Operations Command, serving as a policy officer dealing with counter proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and Marine Corps matters. Upon his departure from USSOCOM, Spiese attended Top Level School at the Army School of Advanced Military Studies as a fellow in the Advanced Operational Arts Studies program. He remained a second year serving as a seminar leader for the Advanced Military Studies program, a second-year program for majors attending the Army Command and General Staff College.
Spiese was assigned to the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in June 1999 as the director, Tactical Training Exercise Control Group. He assumed command of the School of Infantry (East) in June 2001 and was assigned as the director, Expeditionary Warfare School, upon relinquishing command in July 2003. In March 2005, Spiese assumed the duties of commanding general, Training Command, deputy commanding general Training and Education Command. Spiese was selected for brigadier general in February 2005. He served as the deputy director for strategy, policy and assessments, U.S. European Command from October 2005. He served as commanding general of Marine Air Ground Task Force Training Command, Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms, Calif., from July 2007. His current assignment, as of May 2008, is commanding general, Training and Education Command.
Brigadier General Spiese was interviewed by MAE Editor Christian Sheehy.
Q: Please provide a historical perspective of professional military education in the Marine Corps.
A: The history of the development of professional military education [PME] in the Marine Corps is marked by two distinct phases. Each phase was initiated by a far-sighted commandant and subordinates who shared his vision.
The first phase began in the early 20th century and paralleled our Corps’ transformation from a modest-sized organization of shipboard detachments to one of corps-sized landing forces that spearheaded the march across the Pacific in World War II. In 1920, our 13th commandant, Major General John A. Lejeune, established Marine Corps schools at Quantico. Central to General Lejeune’s vision was that our schools would engage in the doctrinal, organizational and technical challenges of warfare in addition to educating officers at selected stages in their careers. The interwar period at Quantico is widely recognized as a time of remarkable intellectual achievement. It was a time when the doctrine and many of the tactics, techniques and procedures for amphibious warfare were developed, and Marine Corps schools were central to this effort. As General Alexander A. Vandegrift said in 1948, “Despite its outstanding record as a combat force in the past war, the Marine Corps’ far greater contribution to victory was doctrinal, that is, the fact that the basic amphibious doctrine which carried Allied troops over every beachhead in World War II had been largely shaped—often in the face of uninterested or doubting military orthodoxy—by U.S. Marines, and mainly between 1922 and 1935.”
During the Cold War, our educational establishment at Quantico continued to expand, and PME gradually came to be viewed as essential to an officer’s intellectual growth and career progression. The second phase of development began in the late 1980s under our 29th commandant, General Alfred M. Gray. In 1988, General Gray instituted a Corps-wide PME program that linked promotions for all Marines, private through general, to a structured program of self-study and formal schooling requirements. One year later, General Gray directed the establishment of the Marine Corps University at Quantico. As explained by one of its founders, General Gray’s vision was “…to create a world-class educational institution, unprecedented in military history.” Subsequently, five commandants have made General Gray’s vision their own and have worked steadily toward its continued fulfillment.
Q: How would you describe the state of professional military education in the Marine Corps today?
A: We have realized General Gray’s vision, but this is an ever-changing, dynamic environment that requires continual refinement while providing new opportunities. Our schools and programs are continuing to improve in ways that educationally challenge students and prepare graduates for subsequent assignments of increased responsibility. We are building an organizational structure that supports a suitable student-teacher ratio in higher local resident schools that fosters continuous learning and faculty development, while continually enhancing content and delivery means for our large nonresident population. We are striving to maximize and integrate state-of-the-art information education technologies to provide students the most effective and efficient educational experiences. We are restructuring our entire Enlisted PME program from corporal through sergeant major/master gunnery sergeant. We have initiated an aggressive building program to provide worldclass, state-of-the-art facilities for our students, faculty and staff at Quantico. We are working to strengthen our outreach, research, publishing and conferencing capabilities to promote scholarship.
Recent and ongoing operations in the global war on terrorism have validated the course charted by General Gray and his successors. The Marine Corps needs leaders at all levels who can think with clarity and purpose in the complicated and confusing situations that characterize irregular warfare. That, in a nutshell, fundamentally describes the purpose of Marine Corps PME.
Q: Please discuss the role of the Marine Corps University [MCU].
A: As the Marine Corps’ proponent for PME, the Marine Corps University focuses on developing the professional competence of Marine leaders through resident and nonresident education. Central to our philosophy is that professional growth depends on Marines actively pursuing PME throughout their careers. Marine leaders at all levels must be skilled in the art and science of war and must be capable of critical thinking, sound judgment and timely decision-making. Curricula is focused on the development of leadership, warfighting, joint and interagency operations, cultural integration and communication skills. The university provides educational opportunities to enlisted personnel and to officers from all branches of the United States armed forces, civilian interagency personnel and international officers. Graduates are prepared to perform in appropriate service, joint, interagency and multinational environments at the tactical, operational and strategic levels.
Q: Please discuss the role of the USMC College of Continuing Education and its relationship to MCU.
A: Our College of Continuing Education [CCE], which mutually supports the Marine Corps University, provides distance education and training opportunities to all Marines, government employees and Marine family members. Globally accessible, CCE programs prepare graduates to perform in service, joint and multinational environments in situations ranging from combat to humanitarian assistance. CCE’s online learning management system, MarineNet, provides educational opportunities to all Marines wherever they are stationed or deployed. Officer distance education includes a worldwide seminar program supported through a network of satellite campuses, learning resource centers and video tele-training centers. New innovations include the elimination of guided self-study in our Command and Staff College [CSC], and the development of asynchronous online seminars for students who are not able to be assigned to local seminars. We are developing a similar construct for Expeditionary Warfare School and are in our second year of a novel combination of resident and online seminar programs for CSC, which includes a mix of international officers with other students in a ratio of about 1 to 1.
Q: What do you see as the main challenges facing the USMC in providing each Marine with the opportunity to receive a quality education?
A: The biggest challenge is finding sufficient time to accommodate all training and education requirements and then achieving a good balance. Currently, many of our Marines spend as much time deployed as they do at home station. We also have an officer career progression model that greatly limits resident PME opportunities. The challenge begins with a balance between work and family responsibilities. The challenge becomes more difficult with the need to balance predeployment training requirements and continuing education requirements. With that in mind, we have made great strides in streamlining our PME programs and in using technology to more efficiently leverage the minimal “white space” available to our busy Marines.
We are currently revising our enlisted PME curricula to eliminate training elements already covered in Military Occupational Specialty [MOS] and advanced training schools, and focusing on critical aspects of combat leadership. This enables us to enhance enlisted education on combat leadership, critical thinking and decision-making.
Officer PME has long emphasized the imperative to create adaptive, thinking leaders and will continue to do so. Due to significant geographic dispersion, most officers fulfill their PME requirements through distance education programs, which has always proved challenging. Even with the ongoing information technology revolution, we routinely face the challenge of meeting the needs of deployed Marines due to bandwidth and connectivity issues. That said, our CCE has demonstrated tremendous resourcefulness and innovation in keeping us ahead of the curve.
Q: What are the primary education-related programs that TECOM has under development?
A: For enlisted Marines, we have completely revised our concept for the relationship between resident and distant education. Previously, we required a Marine to complete PME requirements through either resident or distance education means. Now, we are revising distance education courses to make them prerequisites for attending resident courses. This approach enables us to tailor each course to subject matter that best fits a particular method of delivery and allows us to shorten resident school curricula and focus on practical application of challenging skills and knowledge, while enabling more Marines to attend resident schools. Our goal is to provide the opportunity for all enlisted Marines to meet their PME requirements through resident education.
Second, I am also excited by another ongoing initiative, the development of the “PME Continuum.” This consists of identifying the spectrum of progressively complex skills and abilities Marines must be able to perform in order to “win in combat by out-thinking and out-fighting their opponents.” The continuum and curricula of our schools are based on student learning outcomes, which are written using Bloom’s Taxonomy and progressive learning matrices used by many institutions of higher learning—military and civilian. Scheduled for completion in early 2010, the PME Continuum will serve as the Marine Corps’ guide for PME curricula and will clearly and systematically articulate the skills and abilities the Marine Corps expects of its graduates in the areas of leadership, warfighting, joint and interagency operations, cultural integration and communications.
Third, we have developed an ambitious growth plan for MCU in order to meet our future educational needs. We plan to expand many existing facilities to enable us to restructure our colleges, improve the student-faculty ratio and increase student enrollment. Incorporating new curricula management and wargaming technologies, the vision of our future construction is to provide state-of-the-art academic facilities for all resident colleges and schools as well as to integrate a progressive information technology infrastructure second to none.
Fourth, we have transformed our distance education programs from 1990s style correspondence courses to robust, learner-focused, seminar programs that have smaller student-to-faculty ratios and use the Socratic Method. Each student is assigned an adjunct faculty instructor and assigned to an on-site seminar at one of our major bases or an online seminar that is free from constraints imposed by time zones.
Finally, we have strengthened our weekend distance education programs in order to meet the needs of reserve component Marines. These programs deliver resident-style PME at locations all over the U.S. and include selected active duty officers as well.
Q: How is TECOM addressing the need to provide Marine students with more distance learning opportunities for education while on deployment?
A: While deployed, Marines find time to read and study while off duty. However, their ability to participate in our PME programs is often limited by internet connectivity and video tele-training [VTT] capability available for nonoperational activities. Even so, we have provided seminars by VTT to Marines deployed to Africa and Guantanamo Bay. We also have arranged online seminars with Marines in Iraq, Afghanistan and deployed aboard ship. We use a combination of technologies, some new, some old, in adapting to whatever works for a particular operational environment.
For remote locations with only modest internet capability, we are forced to rely on e-mail and e-mail list managers for collaboration. In such cases, CCE must provide hard-copy books and CDs. Still, our online seminars can reach anyone with an e-mail connection. Where feasible, we strive to group individuals deployed to the same location in an on-site seminar.
For those deployed to a location with robust internet connectivity, we are experimenting with a synchronous online seminar using Eluminate Live, which will enhance our ability to conduct practical exercises with Marines who are unable to access an on-site location. We believe this initiative will enhance our Marines’ ability to learn and apply the Marine Corps Planning Process—an integrated top-down planning process which supports a commander’s decision-making capability involving mission analysis, course of action [COA] development, COA wargaming, COA comparison and decision, orders development, and transition to orders execution.
We have been pleasantly surprised by the incredible expansion of enlisted nonresident enrollment in the face of short dwell between deployments, which speaks volumes of our Marines’ hunger for professional development. I think it is fair to say our CCE is continually reaching out to Marines to find new solutions to their distance learning needs.
Q: What civilian institutions does TECOM partner with and what programs are offered in connecting Marines with collegiate-level educational opportunities?
A: The Marine Corps University is organized similar to civilian educational institutions and embraces adult learning theory and benchmark educational processes. Three of our colleges are regionally accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools [SACS] and able to award regionally accredited master’s degrees to graduates. Our faculty consists of civilian professors with doctorates in a variety of fields along with active duty officers with specific subject matter expertise. Our programs also support Marines seeking degrees from civilian institutions. For our resident and distance education programs which do not offer degrees, the American Council on Education [ACE] reviews selected courses and recommends transfer college-level credits.
SACS accreditation and ACE transfer credit recommendations attest to the rigor of our educational programs and validate our curriculum development and educational processes. While accreditation and validating transfer credits are not the primary goals of our PME programs, they do provide valuable benefits to our students. The foremost goal of PME is to produce graduates empowered to lead Marines and meet the challenges of the future national security environment.
Q: How does TECOM coordinate with other services to assist career Marines seeking to further their education?
A: We coordinate USMC educational policy and attendance at a number of Joint education-related meetings, working groups and conferences, including the Military Education Coordination Council, the Enlisted Military Education Review Council and the Joint Faculty Education Conference. TECOM is the Marine Corps liaison for joint matters to the Joint Staff’s Joint Education Branch, and we coordinate with Army, Navy and Air Force counterparts in all matters concerning joint education policies and requirements. We have Marine students at all Joint Professional Military Education [JPME] accredited schools and we offer many opportunities for PME in foreign countries. We also have many fellowship opportunities with highly regarded civilian institutions such as Johns Hopkins, Brookings, RAND, Tufts, MIT, Harvard and Stanford, among others.
Our intermediate-level schools, both resident and nonresident, are JPME Phase I accredited. Our Top Level School is JPME Phase II accredited. These schools also undergo the Process for Accreditation of Joint Education [PAJE], which includes a rigorous examination of curricula by the Joint Staff in order to ensure joint education requirements are met. This process is consistent with accepted civilian accreditation standards and practices, though tailored to meet the needs of JPME. Both our Command and Staff College and the Marine Corps War College were recently reaccredited.
Regarding enlisted PME, the concept of JPME is still in its infancy in all of the services. However, we are in our third year of participating in the Enlisted Military Education Review Council and have identified and implemented joint learning outcomes in our enlisted PME courses.
For distance education, the CCE participates in the Distance Learning Coordination Council, a group of distance learning scholars and faculty from all services who exchange ideas on new distance education approaches and technologies. The CCE is also testing a new and unique initiative that will create a student body equally divided between U.S. and foreign officers. The curriculum combines 11 weeks of resident education with 28 weeks of online seminar education designed to enable students to complete PME requirements concurrent with normal duties. Initial results are very promising.
Q: Finally, what do you see as the primary challenges facing the USMC and TECOM in meeting the educational needs of the 21st century Marine?
A: Perhaps the biggest challenge is the inherent conflict between the demands of the long war and the very nature of education. As mentioned earlier, the long war and the unprecedented operational tempo we’ve experienced since September 11, 2001, place a tremendous premium on time available for training and education. The prolonged stress on our Marines and our forces has both short-term and long-term dimensions. In the short term, educational requirements, like learning about the local culture for an impending deployment, compete with a myriad of training requirements, equipment maintenance, administrative preparations and, just as important, postdeployment and predeployment downtime. Rarely do deploying units find enough time to accomplish everything required and, for the foreseeable future, this dilemma isn’t going away. Often, training, maintenance and administrative requirements are more tangible than educational requirements and, therefore, more difficult to put off. By its nature, education becomes the easiest thing to move down the priority list.
In the long term, the conflict between a service indefinitely at war and its PME requirements is even more pronounced. Education, by nature, requires time for study, research, reflection and interaction with other students and professors. It is a deliberate, time-intensive process. Yet a “long-war mentality” leaves many Marines believing they don’t have time for PME and there’s too much else to accomplish between assignments in the operating forces. This is a pernicious problem with no easy solution.
A second challenge is the dilemma of prioritizing among conflicting future operational demands and tailoring our educational programs to meet them. In less than 20 years, we have been committed to two large, conventional wars, along with numerous, longer commitments to irregular wars. Attaining the right balance between preparing Marines for irregular—or hybrid—warfare and our core capabilities has been a perennial challenge since at least the end of Vietnam, and it isn’t going to go away anytime soon.
In summary, I would like to share a quote from our current commandant, General James T. Conway. He states, “From recruit training through senior staff NCO professional military education and from Officer Candidates School through our Senior Leader Development Program, we must continue to build thinking, decisive, innovative Marines, imbued with initiative and empowered to act within the construct of commander’s intent and in the face of potentially confusing, chaotic and unclear situations.” ♦