The Student Veterans of America (SVA) and the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the U.S. (VFW) will partner up to help student veterans access their GI Bill benefits, according to a news release from the SVA.
The groups have created a new program, called 1 Student Veteran, to make it easy for students to access their education benefits and fix any problems they run into while trying to enroll.
VFW National Veterans Service Assistant Director Jim Wear, the man who will manage the new program, says in the release, “Our goal is to mitigate errors and resolve conflicts on the lowest possible level to ensure VA can deliver timely, accurate GI Bill benefits.” The VFW claims that, in its history, it has already helped 125,000 veterans get $3.7 billion in earned benefits.
Michael Dakduk, the executive director of SVA, complains that the claims process for veterans is too complex. Student veterans who experience problems with their GI Bill typically have to wait months to file a formal appeal to the government. The 1 Student Veteran program gives students more direct access to the VA regional offices by allowing them to work with representatives from the SVA and VFW.
The hope of the 1 Student Veteran program is to make the process of college enrollment easier for those veterans who experience any problems with the VA in receiving educational benefits. Students can email them at 1studentveteran@vfw.org and they promise to help them in a timely manner. Program service officers will either go directly to the appropriate VA regional office to resolve the issue, or they will give the student another course of action to help them with their individual circumstance.
In the last year, the Department of Veteran Affairs itself has made progress at automating the claims process to help students access their benefits. According to a March 13 news release, The VA reports that, during the month of February, 79 percent of incoming documents for enrolling students were either fully or partially automated. The result of this automation has been quicker enrollment time. In the last year, they have cut in half the processing time it takes for new students to enroll. And for currently enrolled students, the VA is providing benefits very quickly. “For enrolled students starting a new semester of classes, processing is taking an average of six days to complete,” says the Office of Public and Intergovernmental Affairs in the release.
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