The number of student veterans in the classroom is increasing rapidly, and there is not a single type of institution that is immune from this trend. While Community colleges, for-profit schools, and two-year schools are the most popular choices for those using the G.I. Bill, public universities are also realizing a drastic increase in the influx of student veterans making their way to college campuses. It is obvious that this is a hot topic in the world of higher education. However, it is not so obvious that colleges and universities are actually doing what is necessary to meet the needs of this particular group of students.
We are currently seeing a trend that universities are severely unprepared to meet the demands of student veterans. This holds true for instructors, administrators, and service providers. While it is not necessary that student veterans receive special treatment above and beyond what any other group of students is entitled to, it is fairly irresponsible that universities did not begin preparing for this trend years ago. I refuse to believe that there are not at least some forward-thinking individuals employed by any given scholarly institution that did not realize this trend was fairly evident five, or even ten, years ago. Fortunately while there are some people that seem to get "it", it is simply a shame their voices were not heard years ago.
There are some touching stories out there that could inspire all of us in higher education to want to become personally involved in the issue at hand. While this is not exactly feasible, it should at least become common place that disability services and counseling centers begin focusing at least part of the resources on meeting the needs of student veterans. Even if we ignore the fact that these students provided a great service to their country, and as Americans to each of us individually, colleges and universities should take the standpoint of providing resources to a growing group of students that are going to make up a larger and larger percent of their student body as we move into the future. Luckily, there are several examples of student groups and fellow veterans that provide support within college communities. This is a good starting point, but institutions cannot rely on students to provide support that should be provided through every day services at the school
Unfortunately, understanding the exact needs of student veterans is not exactly information that is easy to come by. It is well stated that this is an area of research that needs a lot of attention. NASPA has even included the topic of student veterans on their Q-List. Additionally, we have not even broached the topic of the needs of the mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, and spouses of student veterans, or family members of deceased veterans, who themselves may be students.
Let us be clear that higher education institutions are beginning to address the needs of student veterans. However, they are just beginning to scratch the surface of understanding what these needs are and how to meet them. Overall, there is not enough being done at this time and we should be applying additional resources to this matter. The fact that this is just now becoming an issue, and we were too ignorant to see it coming years ago, makes me want to say "Really? This is unbelievable!"
Because of a class project in fall 2010, I was able to interview both the directors of the centers at Colorado State University and the University of Northern Colorado (UNC) as well as three student veterans.
ReplyDeleteRecently, the center at UNC underwent a massive revision and a new director was hired in January 2010. This means the new policies and attitudes towards veterans as students at UNC have only been implemented for a year and a half! At the time of the interview, the director, as well as all three students, indicated that because of the young age of the center, they were still focusing on promotion of services and the basic needs of the students. They indicated that, as Jason references, the paperwork for dependants to receive benefits, such as funding for school, was one of the highest priorities of the center. Basic needs, such as rent, were still issues for these veterans and transitioning into becoming college students was on the back burner. Thankfully, the center at CSU is connected to the Adult Learning Center and both are fairly well established, meaning the initial learning processes and red tape were already streamlined. The director said combining the two centers removed some of the stigma returning veterans’ face at traditional college campuses and they were able to focus on higher levels of student development for this population.
Jason makes a good point in that it seems although almost the entire world realized the United States was involved in a long term, international military conflict, institutions of higher education have been painfully slow to prepare for the influx of returning veterans as students. My belief is that the Veterans Administration was slow to facilitate the transition and funding to institutions that did not already have resources in place, possibly because the government itself was unprepared for the large influx of veterans who are taking advantage of the G.I. Bill.
Another issue not mentioned will be that students taking advantage of these centers expect the centers to be managed by veterans and not the general population. There is something to be said for the director having a “been there, done that” approach to the entire transition process and not all Student Affairs professionals will be able to relate.
I'm not sure that it's fair to say that higher education is standing "idly by" when it comes to student veterans. Are we doing the best job possible? Probably not. However, several institutions have hired veteran service coordinators since the Iraq/Afghanistan wars have started, including (as mentioned by Janella) CSU, UNC, and also add CU to that list.
ReplyDeleteI attended a student veteran panel in May 2011 with the Coalition of Colorado Alcohol and Drug Educator group. The most interesting thing that these student veterans had to say was that IF they had managed to connect with student services, they were successful. However, the attitude ingrained from their military backgrounds was that seeking assistance made them feel weak. Ultimately, they would rather ask another veteran how to access certain things or how a certain professor may treat them in class.
This makes me think that re-orienting our veteran student services to a peer education model (much like what have used for the last 10-20 years with alcohol and drugs, sexual health, etc) may best serve our veteran student populations.
Perhaps a lot of our barriers to stronger veteran services on our campuses has to do with the "silo-ing" that is so often talked about in higher education. There may be a lot going on, but we just don't see it because it's not on our proverbial radars.
I agree with Jill here. As someone who is new to working in Veterans Services, I've been really glad to see the wealth of information available to help me develop programs and services for vets. Just last fall, CAS came out with Standards for Veterans Services Programs (http://www.cas.edu/index.php/updates/)- putting Veterans Services on the map so to speak as a distinct (and important!) functional area. Between this, and the myriad of resources offered through our various professional associations, I’m experiencing ‘info-glut’ of student veteran resources!
ReplyDeleteJill—you are onto something with the peer mentoring. Student Veterans of America (linked to in Jason’s post) is the national student vet. club/organization, and definitely advocates for the peer mentor type of approach (though they don’t refer to it that way). I think that we need to continue to assess how we might adapt existing programs or approaches to best serve student vets/military personnel—based on the specific needs of our respective unique populations (as Jason suggests).
The SALUTE Honor Society (founded here in Colorado at CSU) is another good example of a traditional program (the honor society) being adjusted to fit the needs of student veterans.
One more thing to add here re. Jason’s comments that we need to ensure that our work is on target with the true needs of our student veterans. I could not agree more. I think that the topic of student veterans is an area in which we are certainly at ‘risk’ for jumping to conclusions about how we should approach the topic, based on national data and/or anecdotal information that we may have available. Since this is indeed a ‘hot topic’, and one that gets quite a bit of media attention, we need to be careful not to move too quickly and make generalizations re. the services that this population may need and how we communicate about those services. I recently had a student veteran tell me, “If one more person tells me about the 1-800 SUICIDE phone number…I just may consider it” (he was joking--- but his point was not lost on me). Although there is no doubt that many vets. experience mental health concerns, and the suicide rates are really very alarming, we need to be cautious not to inadvertently assume that all student veterans are considering suicide, have PTSD or TBI, are disabled, or countless other stereotypical concerns or characteristics. We need to be strategic in balancing the responsibility to address significant issues of concern that do manifest within the student veteran population with the fact that many student veterans do not want their programming on campus to revolve around such ‘issues’. We should conduct needs assessments with student veterans at our own institutions to determine the true needs of our unique students. Then, we should use this information (along with the emerging research) to shape our services.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to the "silo-ing" mentioned by Jill, I think various departments on college / university campuses spent alot of time looking around at each other, wondering who was going to take this population on...Financial Aid? Admission? Registration? Student Support Services? Some other department?
ReplyDeleteWe have people on campus (most veterans themselves) who are passionate about serving this population, but when we consider providing dedicated support services to them, we get stuck because we have no money to hire additional staff to serve them, and the remaining employees already have plates that are overfull. So, we cobble together services, and in all honesty, things have gone fairly well.
What has really had the biggest impact is carving out a very small office (seriously, two chairs, two very small computer desks and a plant are all that fit in there...it's like a big closet) just off of our main student area, and calling it the Veteran's Club.
The Club is run entirely by the Vets on campus and having that physical space to call their own, to hang out with fellow Vets near the general student population - but just separate enough to feel private and secure, has really helped them to settle in and feel a sense of belonging on campus.
I just did a brief search online to find orientation programs for veteran students to see what is available. I noticed that there are some very specific orientation programs out there which include speakers and organizations that support veteran students (e.g. American Legion, VFW, VA Services, etc.). There are even programs and guides out there to help student affairs professionals learn more-who may not have any military background in creating a more “veteran friendly campus.”
ReplyDeleteFor every under represented population on our campus(es), we need to learn and understand how to help all students. We have much to learn and thankfully there are people willing to help us and improve our services to better assist all students.
Here is one guide to review:
http://www.studentveterans.org/resourcelibrary/documents/CreatingaVeteranFriendlyCampus_AGuideforCollegeandUniversityAdministrators.pdf
You are correct that veteran populations are growing at colleges and universities (and quickly). Currently, we have one VA Coordinator and we went from serving about 250 Vets last fall, to almost having 400 vets this fall! While we know we have this large population of students, finding the funds to provide additional services to VA students has proven challenging. As Darcy stated, not only finding the funds is a challenge, figuring out "where VA belongs" has been another challenge.
ReplyDeleteCurrently, we are looking at ways to partner with Center for Students with Disabilities, but many of our VA students do not feel they have a "disability" and do not want to be labeled as such. We have also created VA orientations throughout the semester to introduce VA students to one another and talk about internal and external services. We are currently putting together a VA student group to helps vets reach out to one another.
Oddly enough, I attended a training yesterday with my entire division to address PTSD and specifically what this means for our current VA population. We learned about issues with closed spaces, loud noises, etc and some techniques to help students cope when working with them. One trauma that I was unaware of that vets deal with on such a regular occurrence is sexual assault. According to the presentation 15% of male veterans and 40% of female veterans were raped while serving in the military (and that is just what is being reported). I found these statistics extremely alarming.
I do not agree that were idly sitting by and not preparing. I do think colleges are responding, but as with anything in higher education finances are challenging. We are currently applying for a grant in hopes of getting more assistance and services for our vets.
Even beyond the issues raised by Jason, are the unique issues related specifically to college bound women veterans. Although I strive to advocate for mental health issues particularly related to veterans on my campus, I am ashamed to admit that the points raised in this article had not been on my radar. The authors shared statistics that revealed the staggering increase in the number of women serving in the armed forces especially the amount of females deployed to combat zones in Iraq or Afghanistan (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ss.314/abstract). Since the boundaries between combat and noncombat areas of conflict are indistinctive in today’s war zones, women are exposed to the brutalities of war in unprecedented ways (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ss.314/abstract). The article focused on the following unique concerns of women veterans in higher education; mental health, sexual assault, and gender identity. As each concern is addressed and described, the authors offer suggestions on how a student service professional might recognize and best serve this student population.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.studentveterans.org/
ReplyDeleteThe link is to Student Veterans of America. This group has spread to 449 campus's nation wide and often meets before congress to discuss the needs of veterans and the challenges they face. They also provide scholarships to veterans as education benefits vary state to state. If you look through the site under "about us" you will also find information for local chapters and being able to submit an email address to receive their newsletter. Currently there is no SVA chapter at UNC however there is one at CSU.