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COLLEGES AIM TO BE VETERAN-FRIENDLY, BUT... --

Campus red tape can trip up student-soldiers.

 

 

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Story here... http://www.columbiatribune
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Colleges aim to be veteran-friendly

Campus red tape can trip up student-soldiers.

By SEAN SPOSITO of the Tribune’s staff

Patrick Campbell returned home from a yearlong tour of duty in Iraq to find that his credit was ruined. The National Guard medic, now a law student at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., said $15,000 in student loans he’d attempted to defer had become delinquent.

As the legislative director for the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, Campbell has successfully lobbied for introduction of federal legislation to make sure other previously deployed student soldiers don’t suffer the same predicament.

The Veterans Education Support Act recently was introduced in the U.S. Senate and House by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Rep. Susan Davis, D-San Diego.

Among other things, the measure would require lenders to cap student loan interest payments at 6 percent while that soldier was deployed.

Existing law requires employers to reinstate previously deployed military employees, but student-soldiers have no such rights.

"In 2003, Congress passed a ‘heroes act,’ which said schools should make reasonable accommodations for students coming home," Campbell said. "Basically that means nothing."

The University of Missouri-Columbia is taking steps to help student-soldiers return to campus life after military service overseas.

MU has a Chancellor’s Task Force for a Veteran Friendly Campus, a 21-person committee whose goal is to streamline the often-complicated procedure of welcoming student-soldiers back to campus.

"We know, in the process of people being called up to active duty or returning to the campus from active duty, that there are policies and procedures that need to be worked out," MU Deputy Chancellor Roger Worthington said.

MU officials are uncertain how many veterans are on campus.

Veterans Affairs information indicates about 250 MU students receive military benefits, said Carol Fleisher, who leads the task force with Lee Henson.

Henson said the group, which had its first meeting on Monday, is trying to find university models that might help make MU more "veteran-friendly."

Task force member Gerald Caetano is president of the Mizzou Student Veterans Association. He said that despite the GI Bill and military tuition assistance, some MU students aren’t getting their needs met. "Every horror story you can think of has happened to at least one person," he said.

A two-time Iraq veteran with 11 years of Army service, Caetano, 30, said the task force’s biggest job is to create a "one-stop shop" for student-soldiers and veterans.

"There is no veteran’s bill of rights for a student at the university saying, ‘If this happens to me, then they’ll treat me like this,’ " he said, calling the task force "a step in the right direction."

Chad Schatz, Missouri director of Veterans Education and Training, said no state or federal law protects the rights of soldiers deployed before the midterm of a semester. Although practically all 320 post-secondary schools in the state capitulate to returning soldiers’ needs, he said, policies vary from college to college.

In "some states, military veterans get free tuition," Caetano said. "If you go up to Wisconsin, you get the same thing. If you go down to Texas, you get the same thing. A lot of states do that. Missouri doesn’t."

State Sen. Maida Coleman, D-St. Louis, introduced a bill in the last legislative session that would cap tuition at $50 per credit hour for recent combat veterans. It was never voted on.

"Supposedly, it’s going to be one of the first bills brought up" in the next session, Caetano said.

The Associated Press has reported that colleges and universities nationwide are creating organizations to aid student-soldiers return to campus.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, new veteran education benefits have been proposed in at least 32 states and signed into law in at least 11 states.

As for a federal soldier education support act, U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., said she plans to co-sponsor the bill that Campbell has endorsed.

"Supporting our troops is more than a slogan on the back of our car," McCaskill said in a prepared statement. "We need to make sure students who are called up to serve do not pay a penalty in terms of their higher education."

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Larry Scott  --