In August 2014, President Obama signed into law the Veterans Access Choice and Accountability Act. Part of the Act mandated that public post-secondary schools must charge non-resident veterans within three years of their discharge date and family members with GI Bill benefits, the same tuition rate as residents of their state. If they didn’t, the school would no longer be approved by the VA to enroll veterans into their education programs.
While the law was originally planned to take effect on July 1, 2015, VA Secretary Bob McDonald granted states a compliance waiver until 31 December 2015. However on November 13, 2015, all 50 states, and all but one territory, had already complied with the law. The Northern Marianas Islands were given a separate waiver to comply at a later date.
While the broad brush stroke of the law seemed somewhat straightforward – public post-secondary schools charging non-resident veterans within three years of their discharge date and family members with GI Bill benefits the same tuition rate as they do residents of their state, one finds a number of exceptions inside of it.
Limited GI Bill coverage
First, the law only covers students using the Post 9/11 GI Bill, Montgomery GI Bill – Active Duty (MGIB-AD), or the GySGT John D. Fry Scholarship Program. Veterans using other GI Bills are not covered under this law and may have to still pay non-resident tuition if not residents of the state where attending school.
Other General Exceptions
The Act does not cover veterans or family member with GI Bill benefits if enrolling after three years from date of discharge. For children using the Fry Scholarship Program, they must enroll within three years of their military parent’s date of death. Fry Scholarship users can still use their benefit after that date, but if non-resident, may have to pay the higher tuition rate.
GI Bill members who start school within three years of discharge, but then skip a semester (excluding the Summer Semester), or transfer schools and lose more than 12 credits, lose the resident tuition eligibility if they start school again after the three year mark.
It also does not apply to students who were in school on or before the original implementation date of July 1st, but are now past their three year date. They will still have to pay the higher tuition rate unless their school grandfathers them in.
Finally just for clarification the law does not apply to active military service members or their dependents. However, many states already offer active duty personnel the resident rate while serving in their state.
The savings can be quite significant under this law as non-resident tuition can be up to three times what a school charges its residents. Because the Post 9/11 GI Bill and Fry Scholarship program can only pay up to the resident rate, the difference is the responsibility of the student.
Under the MGIB-AD, the student gets a fixed amount and has to pay their own tuition. The lower the tuition, the more likely the amount they get from their GI Bill will cover the cost of tuition.
For the students covered, this is a boon to reducing out-of-pockets costs. For military members recently discharged that had planned on starting school after attaining residency – in most cases living in the state for at least one year – they can start school now at the same cost as they would have otherwise paid one year down the road.
