re: Kent State Anniversary

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if your birthday was one of the first 50 or so picked each year, you were going to vietnam. i guess if you went to college you got a deferment. anyway, many joined other military branches instead of being drafted into the army.

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You're describing the lottery (birthday). For most of the war there was no lottery. You were picked by the local draft board to meet their quota. When the lottery was established they advertised that the first 150 names would be drafted. This was a lie. They were trying to scare kids under 150 to volunteer for another service besides the army.
The college deferment was there for the first half of the war and then was dropped before the lottery came in. So, lots of kids finished their freshman year of college and then got drafted when their birthday was in the first 100.