New GI Bill Would Help Vets Go To Private Schools

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Arizona Daily Star (Tucson)
June 7, 2008 By Associated Press
When Walter Hendricks returned home from France in 1946 to start a college on his Vermont farm, 35 of the first 50 students were fellow GIs — young men experienced beyond their years, eager to learn, and grateful for a peaceful place to do so.
Sixty-two years later, Marlboro College is firmly established, known for independent students who direct their own course of study.
But it no longer teems with veterans. In fact, there is just one.
Senior Jeff Bristol served in Afghanistan, but says it's not through the government-provided education benefits of the Montgomery GI Bill (today's version of the original GI Bill) that he can afford to attend the private college. To pay for college, Bristol also needed the money he earned as a private contractor in Iraq after his tour of duty.
Soon, however, there could be more money available to send veterans to private schools under a new GI Bill being finalized in Congress.
Those who qualify would have more freedom to choose distinctive colleges like Marlboro, rather than being limited by finances to the community, for-profit and regional public colleges where most troops have typically used their GI benefits.
"It's not just some other school where you are force-fed knowledge in a class with 500 people," Bristol wrote of Marlboro, in an e-mail from Morocco, where he is traveling and doing research this summer. "That might work out for some, but for me it was a waste of time."
The legislation, expected to pass both chambers of Congress by veto-proof majorities early next week, makes a range of changes affecting cost-of-living allowances, the time veterans have to use benefits, and other aspects of the complex web of veterans' education benefits.
But the change that has gotten the most attention is that the government would cover full tuition for veterans at their state's most expensive public college.
For students hoping to attend private institutions like Marlboro, the government would provide the cost of the priciest public university plus a dollar-for-dollar match of aid the colleges provide to help make up the difference.
Bristol says liberal arts colleges like Marlboro could particularly benefit from having more veterans because they "rely so much on their students and what they bring to the table."
The added benefits will cost an estimated $52 billion over 10 years. President Bush and some lawmakers have supported an alternative measure, arguing the current legislation is so generous it will discourage re- enlistment.
Late this week, however, the White House signaled Bush might sign the legislation.
After first balking at the cost, lawmakers were persuaded that allowing GIs to attend whatever colleges are best for them was worth it.
"Veterans should be able to dream the same dreams that other students have," said Dartmouth College President James Wright, a veteran himself, who lobbied lawmakers to include the private-college provision.
The original 1944 GI Bill helped educate nearly 8 million World War II veterans, flooding campuses ranging from land-grant state schools to the Ivy League.
But veterans' advocates argue the benefits haven't kept pace with tuition increases, relegating veterans to a second-class educational experience. They have cited figures showing 90 percent of veterans attend community college at some point, compared with 38 percent of people overall.
Partly, that reflects many veterans aren't ready for four-year college work, but financial issues certainly play a role, too.
"We should be able to give people the opportunity to choose what's best for them," said Patrick Campbell, legislative director for Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "The whole purpose of the GI Bill isn't just to get people into college; it's to give people a chance to catch up to where they would have been."
 
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