When veterans come home from war and try to put their lives back together, there’s often a giant missing link in their transition: Clear advice on getting back to school and managing the next phase of their education.
“Where you are going next is a huge hole in the system, and there is no entity in the community to help them figure out where to start,’’ Pamela Tate, president and CEO of CAEL (Council for Adult and Experiential Learning), said at a hearing on educating veterans in Washington D.C. last week. “They don’t know where they should go to school, what they should study and what careers are there for them.’’
A bilateral security agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan could allow for a lasting presence of troops there through 2024, sending even more veterans into limbo.
That means the road to higher education will remain fraught with challenges for U.S. veterans, some two million men and women who have or will return from Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in the next few years.
It’s a sad state of affairs for a country that educated about 10 million returning veterans after World War II – including three U.S. presidents, three Supreme Court justices, 14 Nobel Prize winners and 24 Pulitzer Prize winners.
The GI bill of 1944 transformed U.S. higher education with benefits allowing veterans to attend any institution that admitted them. The bill helped support spouses and children and offered preparation for vocational careers in construction, auto mechanics and electrical wiring, among others.
