FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

16 NOV 2020

SWAN Urges Congress to Halt Implementation of Army Combat Fitness Test (ACFT)
Secondary effects of ACFT could negatively impact Army readiness

Washington D.C. – This week, SWAN issued a letter to both the Senate Armed Services Committee and the House Armed Services Committee (SASC/HASC) urging that committee members engaged in negotiating the FY 2021 National Defense Act retain provision S.4049 Section 592 in the bill’s final version. Section 592 halts the implementation of the new Army Combat Fitness Test (ACFT) until an independent study is conducted. SWAN believes the study should assess the probable impact of the ACFT on accessions and retention; training for and exercise of other critical combat and MOS skills; the reserve and guard components; a future draft; risks of injury; and, particularly, its impact on the career prospects for women and older soldiers. It should also consider impacts on those with necessary skills in fields such as medicine and cyber warfare who meet all occupational standards of their current MOSs, passed the previous Physical Fitness Test (PFT) and who have proven themselves in combat zones over the past 18 years.

As explained further in SWAN’s letter to the SASC/HASC, the precipitous implementation of the ACFT on October 1, 2020 is:
“…a development we consider hasty––even rash––because too many otherwise qualified soldiers are failing elements of the test. The premises undergirding the ACFT are that every soldier is a warrior first, that superior physical strength is singularly critical in battle and so is demanded of every soldier––no matter their MOS. While we believe muscular strength and endurance are necessary for success in battle and certainly support training to increase them, other qualities¬¬––physical, ethical and mental––are just as important. We are concerned that the considerable time and effort each soldier will have to commit to reaching and maintaining the high levels of strength the ACFT demands––especially over a career that spans 20 or 30 years––will reduce emphasis on other attributes important in combat such as leadership, trust and teamwork.”

SWAN attributes the ACFT’s less than 50% passage rate for women in the third quarter of 2020 partly to the methodology the Army used to standardize the test, the Baseline Soldier Physical Readiness Requirements Study (BSPRRS). The BSPRRS’s average study participant was a 24-year-old male. Additionally, the BSPRRS which the Army claims is 80% predictive, included only 16 women––average age 23 and all volunteers. Additionally, during the three phases of AFCT evaluation, women were hugely underrepresented––at best under 15% of participants were women and at worst only 10.5%. Therefore, in addition to reviewing the ACFT’s impact on individual soldiers and units, other areas of great importance to Army readiness such as recruitment and retention, the Reserve and Guard components should also be examined. The study must scrutinize the flaws already identified in the BSPPRS, determine if there are additional flaws and ascertain if these flaws colored the Army’s methodology for choosing and norming ACFT events.

SWAN’s CEO, Deshauna Barber concludes, “A fitness test that is so clearly biased simply cannot move forward without further review from an independent study that assesses all possible impacts of the ACFT. If not further reviewed, the implications of implementing the ACFT can have irreparable damage to the diversity of talent in our Army.”

About the Service Women’s Action Network
SWAN is a national, non-partisan organization and member-driven community network advocating for the individual and collective needs of service women and women veterans. To date, SWAN has played a major role in opening all military jobs to service women, holding sex offenders accountable in the military justice system, eliminating barriers to disability claims for those who have experienced military sexual trauma, and expanding access to a broad range of reproductive healthcare services for military women.