Talking Stick - November/December 2014 - 46

be ready
With the number of student veterans
rising on campus, you will find this
mix of resources helpful in your
planning.
*	 Elizabeth	O'Herrin,	"Enhancing	
Veteran Success in higher
education: Returning Adult
Students," Peer Review (Winter
2011).
*	 Alexandria	Radford,	Military
Service Members and Veterans
in Higher Education: What
the new gi Bill May Mean for
Postsecondary institutions (July
2009).
*	 M.	David	Rudd,	Jeffrey	Goulding,	
and	Craig	Bryan,	"Student	
Veterans: A national Survey
exploring Psychological Symptoms
and Suicide Risk," Professional
Psychology: Research and Practice
(October 2011).
*	 The	White	House,	Executive
Order - Establishing Principles
of Excellence for Educational
institutions Serving Service
Members, Veterans, Spouses, and
Other Family Members (April 27,
2012).

folks, even in our field, who thought
it was not such a great idea," says Art
Sandeen, faculty member and former
vice president for student affairs at the
University of Florida in Gainesville.
Before the GI Bill was signed,
University of Chicago President Robert
M. Hutchins notably said, "Colleges
and universities will find themselves
converted into educational hobo jungles.
And veterans, unable to get work, will
find themselves educational hobos. . . .
It is a threat to American education [and]
education is not a device for coping with
mass unemployment."
Beyond the general disagreement
regarding the bill's merit, specific
populations were denied benefits. In
some states, black former servicemen
were unable to access GI Bill provisions
due to racial discrimination and poor
administration of the bill's benefits.
Veterans who did not identify as
straight could be excluded from the
bill's provisions due to a clause denying
benefits to any soldier released from
service dishonorably. According to a
1945 Veterans Administration ruling,
"homosexual acts or tendencies"
warranted such a discharge and left
many World War II veterans ineligible
for any GI Bill benefits.
Though antidiscrimination policies
were eventually implemented, other
challenges were still relevant: transition
issues, difficulty understanding and
accessing benefits, bureaucratic hurdles,
and distress related to physical and
mental health trauma. Still, millions
did enroll in higher education, and, by
the end of the 1940s, veterans were the
majority of the student population on
many campuses, Sandeen says. Because
housing was a top concern of higher
education administrators, housing
professionals often became the de facto
campus leaders for veterans' services.
The sudden influx of students was
so great that it was impossible to build
traditional housing options quickly
enough to meet demand. "At the
University of Florida, as at many other
schools, we quickly put up Quonset
huts, or our students lived on nearby

46

TalkiNg STick

bases, and housing folks coordinated
buses, childcare, health services from
there," Sandeen explains. Housing
officers were nimble, resourceful, and
flexible in their responses. "It was one of
the proudest moments in student affairs
history, and one of the best examples
of leadership I've ever seen," Sandeen
comments.
For decades, most campuses had
no dedicated office or personnel for
student veteran services, and housing
officers continued to take a major role in
student veterans' success on college and
university campuses. From their work
offsetting the widespread antagonism
faced by students who served in Vietnam
to their support of students with injuries
and disabilities following the Gulf Wars,
housing officers were consistently at the
forefront of supporting student veterans'
success.

a Profile of Today's
veteran
According to Alexandria Radford's
synthesis of military service members
and veterans in higher education, 4
percent of all American undergraduates
were veterans or active service members
by 2007-08, though only 38 percent took
advantage of their educational benefits
during this time. When compared to
the rest of the student population, GI
Bill beneficiaries are more likely to be
married, non-white, significantly older,
and male, though after 9/11 women have
represented a quickly growing portion
of the student veteran population.
Student veterans favor STEM fields
like computer science and are more
likely than their civilian counterparts to
engage in distance learning. According
to O'Herrin, more than 800,000 of
the 2.2 million soldiers who served in
Iraq and Afghanistan have deployed
more than once, and a conservative
estimate suggests that 14-19 percent
experience symptoms of post-traumatic
stress disorder, serious depression, or
traumatic brain injury.
Gladys Smith, assistant director of
counseling/life development at Webster
Talking Stick - November/December 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Talking Stick - November/December 2014
