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Federal Maritime Academy, that the faculties don't have any flow or ability to move. Do you think it would be desirable to have a faculty open?

Admiral O'DONNELL. Yes, sir. I think if we could have certain kinds of exchanges, it would be helpful. Of course there are ways for faculties to upgrade themselves and keep themselves alive within institutions. Research is one way; going to meetings of the learned and professional societies, and by doing consulting work will also maintain skills. Many colleges privately owned and not in a big system maintain a faculty with a very high state of effectiveness by these methods, and we are trying to do this in New York State.

We have some research programs going. We have one engineering professor who is doing some information retrieval work for these new Coast and Geodetic Survey ships, the Discovery and the Observer.

We have an economist who is doing some work on Latin American trade and that sort of thing. I think it can be done in this way. Mr. MURPHY. Admiral, do you maintain a school ship? Admiral O'DONNELL. Yes, sir.

Mr. MURPHY. What is its relative age?

Admiral O'DONNELL. It's on the order of 22 years I believe. It is a C-3. Previously it was the USNS Private Gibbons.

Mr. MURPHY. It will be adequate to meet your needs, say, for 5 years?

Admiral O'DONNELL. Did you say for another 5 years?

Mr. MURPHY. Yes.

Admiral O'DONNELL. Yes, sir. I think so. We are taking very good. care of it, and I think it will last for another 5 years.

Mr. MURPHY. Admiral, on a comparative basis, does it cost you more per student to educate a man for the merchant marine because of your location in a high cost of living area such as New York vis-a-vis Texas, maybe, or California?

Admiral O'DONNELL. Our faculty salaries are higher than Texas. But this would be the only element of additional cost that we have seen direct figures on.

Mr. MURPHY. Would there be a higher cost in, let's say, construction and maintenance, as well as the carrying charge on the installation at Fort Schuyler as compared with the Texas and Maine and Massachusetts and California installations?

Admiral O'DONNELL. I am really not an expert on this, but of course I believe this is so. We are building a student activities building, and we opened bids last December and had a million dollars to build it, and the lowest bid was $1.4 million. So we shaved off something in the building and the State gave us $200,000 more and we got the barebones building for $1.2 million, plus architectural fees.

Mr. MURPHY. Do you think there should be some valve in Federal legislation that doesn't tie it down to a certain dollar amount per student whether it is New York or Texas, but that, because of the increased costs in the different areas, that a student going to New York Academy should be allocated a higher amount as opposed to other areas of the country?

Admiral O'DONNELL. I would judge that this is possible within the Hathaway bill because it sets a floor, sets a minimum of $600. Otherwise, I don't really feel qualified to make that kind of judgment between, say, Texas and New York. I really don't know.

Mr. MURPHY. Admiral, thank you very much. I appreciate it.
Mr. DOWNING. Thank you very much, Admiral.

Admiral O'DONNELL. Thank you.

(The charts appended to the statement follow :)

STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK MARITIME COLLEGE, FT. SCHUYLER, BRONX, NY

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Total_

17,669, 907 116, 525, 535 21, 239, 415 1, 177, 761 283, 305 3 36, 895, 923 4,908, 717

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552

6, 683

387, 463

537

1, 812

6,936

428, 825

515

32,568

8,397

437,548

574

34,882

29, 130

448, 863

567

37,853

15, 213

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STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK MARITIME COLLEGE-FORT SCHUYLER, BRONX, N.Y.

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Mr. DOWNING. Our next witness is an extremely knowledgeable person in the maritime schools. He is Milton Nottingham, the legislative representative of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy Alumni Association.

STATEMENT OF MILTON G. NOTTINGHAM, JR., LEGISLATIVE REPRESENTATIVE, U.S. MERCHANT MARINE ACADEMY ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

Mr. NOTTINGHAM. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

It is a great pleasure to appear before you and your esteemed colleagues.

I am Milton G. Nottingham, Jr., the immediate past president of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy Alumni Association and presently the legislative representative of the association.

Gentlemen, the alumni of Kings Point welcome this opportunity to present our views on H.R. 8328 introduced by Mr. Keith and H.R. 8785 introduced by Mr. Hathaway and the companion bills introduced by other Members of the House of Representatives. The primary purpose of these bills is to authorize increased financial support for the several State maritime academies.

We recognize the very important and substantial contribution to the American Merchant Marine made by the State maritime academies and therefore regret that we cannot support this proposed legislation. Our opposition to these bills should not be construed to reflect opposition to the State academies, for this is not so.

Several of the State maritime academies were training officers for our merchant fleet long before Kings Point was established and we trust they will continue to produce well skilled officers for the ships of the future.

H.R. 8328 provides for a substantial increase in Federal funds for each student at a State maritime academy and imposes a repayment obligation upon the graduate in the event he does not serve at sea for a period of years equal in number to those he spent at the State academy.

This bill does not provide for any additional benefits for the students at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, however, it stipulates that the same repayment obligations be applied to graduates of the Federal academy. This presupposes that the graduates of the State and Federal academies are not fulfilling their obligation to serve at sea as licensed officers in the U.S. merchant marine.

The sailing record of the graduates of Kings Point proves conclusively that our men do fulfill their obligation to sail for a minimum of 3 years in the merchant marine, or alternatively, to serve on active duty as officers in the U.S. Navy or the U.S. Coast Guard.

With your permission, Mr. Chairman, we would like to submit as an attachment to this statement a graph chart prepared by the Maritime Administration which reflects the employment of the graduates of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy covering the period from 1963 to 1968, inclusive.

The statistics show that 99 percent of the class of 1968 were sailing in the merchant marine when this survey was taken last June. The percentage of those sailing in the merchant marine or serving in the Armed Forces during the other years covered by this graph are equally impressive. As a matter of fact, we can state conservatively that almost three-fourths of the Kings Pointers graduated in the past 7 years are now sailing.

We believe this record shows that the repayment-for-education provision of this bill is not needed, insofar as Kings Point graduates are concerned. It should be noted that the Kings Point trainees are midshipmen, U.S. Naval Reserve, and with rare exceptions are commissioned as ensigns, USNR, upon graduation.

These commissions are subject to revocation if the recipient fails to remain at sea for at least 3 years in the merchant marine or to serve on active duty in the Navy. In the event the commission is revoked,

the individual then becomes subject to induction in the Armed Forces through selective service. Should a means be needed to insure that a maritime academy graduate serve at sea, it is doubtful that a better one could be found than that.

On the other hand, we must point out that when considering sailing obligations, it must be recognized that our merchant marine is a cyclical industry and often seagoing employment opportunities have been lacking. In fact, we are facing a fleet reduction today. Moreover, hiring practices within maritime officers' unions make it extremely difficult for the young officer beginning his career to obtain and maintain full employment that would fulfill the requirements of this proposed legislation.

We oppose H.R. 8785 because it fails to limit the funds that can be made available per student at a State maritime academy, fails to place a limitation upon the number of students to be given Federal assistance, and fails to limit Federal assistance to the State maritime academies now existent.

It seems to us entirely reasonable for Federal funds to be given to a State maritime academy on the same basis as Federal assistance to other State educational institutions is provided. However, the provisions of H.R. 8785 would tend to encourage the establishment of additional State maritime academies for which little if any justification may be found.

The U.S. Merchant Marine Academy was established in 1941 and permanently chartered by act of Congress in 1956 to train young men from every State in the Union. To create additional State maritime academies when a need has not been shown makes as little sense as would the creation of multiple State military, naval, coast guard, and air force academies.

Kings Point is operating at far less than capacity while all but one of the State maritime academies have either increased their enrollment or have plans to do so. Moreover, other States and at least one territory are considering opening maritime academies.

Mr. Chairman, gentlemen, it is most propitious that you are considering legislation relative to merchant marine officer training at this time. Within the next few days, actually at this moment the administration is unveiling their new plans for the merchant marine. In fact, we believe that there will be no need for mandatory obligations to encourage graduates of the Federal and State maritime academies to pursue careers at sea and in the maritime industry providing that the Nation builds and maintains a strong merchant marine that will offer employment opportunities, job security, and promotion potential on a continuing basis.

The ships of the U.S. merchant fleet will only be as good as the men who build, direct, and sail them. Kings Point does not train a young man merely to be a ship's officer, although this is its primary mission. Of at least equal importance is the secondary mission of training leaders for the marine industry. As the Naval and Coast Guard Academies train future admirals rather than ensigns and the Military and Air Force Academies train future generals instead of second lieutenants, Kings Point trains the leaders of the maritime industry.

How good is the record you may wonder? Well, we can point with pride to the fact that one-fourth of our U.S.-flag merchant ships have

Kings Point graduates as captains or chief engineers or both; that five of the major U.S. shipping companies have Kings Pointers as their chief executive officers; that the project manager of the epic making transit of the Northwest Passage by the tanker Manhattan and the commanding officer of the Apollo recovery ship, U.S.S. Hornet, are also graduates of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.

These men are not the exception, for the middle management ranks of our industry are replete with graduates of Kings Point, and a third or more of the Panama Canal pilots are from the Merchant Marine Academy. Other graduates may be found in every phase and facet of shipping from Government to banking.

The Merchant Marine Academy was established only a little over 25 years ago and is thus the next to youngest of the five Federal academies. While the sons of Kings Point look with pride upon the record of accomplishment of the Merchant Marine Academy, we look to an increasingly important role for the Academy in the future. Kings Point can and should be a center for maritime research and development and for advanced maritime education.

Maritime Administrator Andrew Gibson recognizes the need for these programs. Under his direction, and with the support of the administration and the Congress, Kings Point should become our future "University of the Sea."

Mr. Chairman, I would like to add to this by saying that frequently, and I notice in the testimony today and the questioning from your colleagues, the thought seems to be that the men will serve their country only if they continue at sea as ships' officers.

It doesn't take 4 years of college education to train a man to be a deck officer or an engineer officer in the merchant marine. The Federal and State maritime academies are training the men to lead, direct, and operate the merchant marine of the future.

We shouldn't evaluate these institutions merely on the basis of the sailing record. It is a primary objective. It's not the sole objective. It's not the long-range objective.

Thank you, gentlemen. I appreciate this opportunity to talk to you. Mr. DOWNING. Thank you, Mr. Nottingham.

Your figures are correct if you take 1963 to 1970, but where we got perturbed were the years 1945 to 1960 when only 15 percent of the academy graduates went to sea.

Mr. NOTTINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, we have a work study here which was distributed to the members of this committee. It was prepared by the alumni office. It covers our graduates from 1938 through 1967, and we feel that it is the most accurate survey made for that period of our

men.

Eighty-five percent of the 997 officers who were graduated from the Academy in the 5 years in that period, say, from 1962 to 1967 were at sea when that survey was made. That was in April of 1967. I think it is also important for you to realize that of the 13.000 graduates approximately of the Federal Academy roughly 9,000 of them, 9,100, were trained prior to 1950 in an accelerated wartime course.

Our men do sail and they have served their country. Most of us are reserve officers in the Navy on a continuing basis. Approximately onethird of the graduates of Kings Point have served on active duty in the Navy. I think that we can dispute any statistics to the contrary.

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