Veterans using the Post-9/11 GI bill will see their monthly living stipends stopped between fall and winter semesters, starting next year, and only full time students will continue to draw stipends at the 100 percent rate.
Those two cost-saving changes, plus a new $17,500 nationwide cap on Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits for students attending private colleges and universities, freed up enough program dollars for Congress to expand new GI Bill eligibility and improve other features, all to take effect by fall of 2011.
So say lawmakers and congressional staff members who negotiated final details of the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Improvements Act of 2010. Congress passed the bill, S 3447, before Christmas. President Obama will sign it into law at a White House ceremony in early January.
Here is part of what was gained by streamlining use of the stipend and imposing the new tuition cap for all private college degree programs:
EXPANDED COVERAGE – Post-9/11 GI benefits no longer will be limited to pursuing a college degree. Veterans will be able to use their benefits also to gain skills through on-the-job training, apprenticeships, vocational-technical schools and other non-degree granting institutions.
MORE GUARD MEMBERS ELIGIBLE – Correcting an oversight of the 2008 GI Bill law, National Guard members soon will quality for the new GI Bill if activated for sufficient length of time since 9/11 under Title 32 for domestic emergencies or homeland security missions. Also qualifying will be fulltime service under the Active Guard and Reserve (AGR) program.
COMPLEXITY REDUCED – New GI Bill benefits used at public colleges and universities will continue to cover full tuition and fees. But the variance in entitlements for attending private colleges will be end through use of a $17,500 benefit cap, to be adjusted annually based on the nationwide rise in education costs. The cap will replace different ceilings in every state based on tuition and fees at its most expensive degree-granting public college.
BOOK STIPENDS — Active duty members and spouses attending college will be eligible for the new GI bill book stipend, up to $1000 a year.
ONLINE STUDENTS – Students exclusively taking classes online will receive a living stipend equal to half of the average housing allowance stipend paid to resident students, a payment of more than $650 a month.
HELP FOR DISABLED – Veterans with service-connected disabilities who are eligible for GI Bill benefits but electing to participate in Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (VRE) training will become eligible for a new living allowance too, of up to $780 a month. This will provide financial help to disabled vets who don’t want to lose VRE case management services but have been missing out on the stipend paid Post-9/11 GI Bill users.
KICKERS – Students who received recruitment or retention kickers from the Defense Department under Montgomery GI Bill or MGIB for Selected Reserves will be able to convert that assistance into Post-9/11 benefits.
Tim Tetz, director of American Legion’s national legislative commission, estimates that 400,000 veterans will benefit from these and other changes in the first year after reforms take effect. He particularly lauded the expansion in type of training covered, and the extension of benefits to as many as 85,000 more National Guard members.
But Tetz said the reduction in stipend payments and the cap on tuition fees for private schools were an unfortunate price to pay to ensure passage.
The reform bill tightens the new GI Bill in less obvious ways too. For example, it will become a kind of payer of last resort, picking up only whatever charges remain after other forms of support, including state-paid educational assistance for veterans, have been applied to school costs.
Earlier drafts of the reform package from the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee would have set the nationwide cap on benefits at private colleges at $20,000. But in late-hour negotiations in the lame-duck session of Congress, the cap was lowered to ensure the reform bill was cost-neutral.
The cap might have been lower than necessary, suggested one Senate source. When the Congressional Budget Office used a more accurate figure for number of National Guard members newly eligible for the Post-9/11 benefits, its final cost estimate came as a surprise to architects of the package. It went beyond cost neutral to save $734 million over 10 years.
Keith M. Wilson, director of VA’s education service, said in a phone interview Wednesday that the totality of changes made to the new GI bill unquestionably will make it better both for beneficiaries and for schools.
“This is a good piece of legislation that addresses a lot of the things that weren’t addressed in, or that we’ve learned since, the initial legislation. From the perspective of the user, it simplifies a lot of things and simplification for our potential students is good,” Wilson said.
He acknowledged the $17,500 cap will cut benefits at some private schools in some states. But he said, “The yellow ribbon program still applies to those private institutions that charge more than that national cap.”
Under yellow ribbon, private colleges can soften the impact of tuition and fees that exceed the cap on GI Bill benefits by waiving up to half of charges not covered and then the VA will reimburse a matching amount.
Veteran service organizations were united in praise of the reform bill. Privately, however, some said they expected more careful consideration of the cap and final passage of the bill in the next Congress.
Rep. Steve Buyer (Ind.), ranking Republican on veterans affairs committee who is retiring from Congress, criticized the rush toward passage and the stalwart support of veterans groups in the face of some benefit cuts.
Veterans in several states, including Texas, New York and New Hampshire, he said, will see GI Bill payments reduced and “will be forced to pay for this reduction from other sources or from their own pocket.”
The typical student veteran, Buyer added, “would oppose improving their own benefit at the expense of one of their comrades…I am surprised that the veterans service organizations have jumped on board in support.”
One vet group countered privately that Buyer had passed on a chance to support a more favorable GI Bill reform package earlier in 2010.
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