The plan is part of a “test run” as the U.S. Marine Corps experiments with ways to end its practice of separating recruits into male and female boot camps.
Until now, female recruits were only training at Parris Island in South Carolina. There have been nine integrated companies trained at that facility over the past year.
A congressional mandate to make entry-level training at both the Parris Island and MCRD San Diego facilities co-ed calls for the practice of separating boot camp groups by gender to end within the next decade, so this company coming to San Diego is another step in that direction.