Hurdles soon to be cleared for veterans

.....Are we ready?
.....An article in this morning’s Inside Higher Ed (Preparing for an Influx) discusses a two-day summit called “Serving Those Who Serve: Higher Education and America’s Veterans,” sponsored at Georgetown University by the American Council on Education:

.....The event comes amid growing attention in higher education, and in society generally, to the issue of how to ensure that the growing legions of men and women who have represented their country in the armed forces return successfully to society. While some colleges have long served military service members and veterans, and many others are just beginning to report growing numbers of veterans flowing onto their campuses, most educators and military officials expect that a boom is around the corner. That’s partly because the number of men and women who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan continues to rise and partly because, as now appears likely, the government is poised to significantly expand educational benefits for veterans, under legislation that Congress is on the verge of passing. [Major Expansion of Veterans’ Tuition Aid Clears Big Hurdle.]
..... “At some point there’s going to be a major influx in the number of veterans going to school,” said Patrick Campbell, legislative director for Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America and a recent graduate of Catholic University of America’s law school. “A lot of schools are treating veterans just like every other student, and that’s just not going to work.”
.....“We have to reintegrate veterans back into our society,” said U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, Vietnam veteran, and leading co-sponsor of the bill now surging through Congress. “Education does that about as well as any sphere of our society. You shape people in ways that other groups can’t,” he told the college officials in the audience.
…
.....There was widespread agreement at the meeting that the veterans’ benefits bill sponsored by Hagel and Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia, assuming it becomes law, virtually wipe out the financial barriers to college that veterans face. Especially, Campbell of the veterans’ association argued, if private colleges and graduate schools find ways to bring their tuitions within reach of the benefits contained in the Webb bill, which would essentially cover the costs of attending the average four-year public college….

• To learn more about the bill, go to FACTS ABOUT THE WEBB-HAGEL-LAUTENBERG-WARNER G.I. BILL (pdf).
• To sign a petition to the President supporting the new G.I. Bill, go to Petition.
• See also White House pushes GI Bill compromise on Iraq bill.

John Stewart on the new G.I. Bill

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