Well, there’s no denying that from my perspective something shifted in American society once the military became utterly dependent on an all-volunteer armed forces. A few years of mandatory service of some kind would make the transition to college a lot less dog-eat-dog; people will have developed empathy for the country as a whole; college itself wouldn’t have to do all the heavy lifting.
And serving an older student body might even have the salutary effect of bringing down the costs of higher education overall.