Army
Army Secretary nominee pledges to expand Junior ROTC
Army Secretary nominee Daniel Driscoll said he would work to expand the Junior ROTC program as a way to boost recruiting and focus on building cyber workforce.

Anastasia Obis
January 30, 2025 6:38 pm
5 min read

Daniel Driscoll, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Army, told lawmakers he will prioritize expanding the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC) program across the country if he is confirmed as the service’s secretary.

“I think that this is a topic that requires focus from the top, and I commit, if confirmed, to looking at this, working with the team, because these are the kind of lineages and relationships and chains that we can build into communities that can get us not just one future soldier, but get us generations of soldiers,” Driscoll said during his Senate Armed Services Committee nomination hearing on Thursday.

The JROTC is a Defense Department funded program that provides citizenship and leadership education at over 3,000 secondary schools across the country and around the globe. Students enroll in JROTC classes as part of their high school curriculum — these courses focus on leadership, citizenship, physical fitness, and discipline. The program is administered by the Army, Navy and Air Force, and classes are taught by former service members.

The military services reported 3,499 JROTC units in fiscal 2023 with a planned increase of 15 units in fiscal 2024. The Army operates approximately 50% of all JROTC units nationwide and across the world.

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