Among the 9 million World War II veterans who used the GI Bill education benefits, one, an intelligence agent who had served in Asia, used the grant to attend France’s Courdon Bleu Cooking School. That vet, Julia Child, rose to culinary and television immortality. The first GI Bill sent veterans to law school to become Supreme Court justices (Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist), prompted many political leaders to earn their first degrees (former Senator Bob Dole), got us to the moon (NASA engineer Dan Herman) and gave us The French Chef.

“No social program did more positive for the future of this country than the original GI Bill,” says Dennis Douglass, deputy director of education service in the Veterans Benefits Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs. “It really placed people in a position where they could become significant contributing members of society.”

It still does. Newly cast as the Montgomery GI Bill in 1984, the benefit gives most Active Duty service members up to $985 per month for up to 36 months to further their education, including certification and licensing tests, business courses and apprenticeships, pilot training, undergraduate and postgraduate college programs. New this year, a provision allows veterans planning to start their own companies to use the Montgomery GI Bill education benefit for certain entrepreneurship courses. GI Bill benefits can also “Top-up” tuition assistance from the services.

Consider this. If you are eligible, you already have contributed $1,200 to the GI Bill fund thanks to monthly $100 deductions to your first year’s paychecks. Now, you are due as much as $35,460. That’s almost a 30-times rate of return on your investment, and it’s there for the taking. Plus, the longer you wait to use it, the more you erode its value.

For veterans, the benefit is available up to 10 years after discharge. “Unlike a lot of GI benefits, the education benefit is time sensitive,” Douglass says. “Each year the benefit isn’t used narrows the window of opportunity. When you get to being a ninth or tenth-year veteran, you don’t get the full benefit.” Even if you start an education program before your eligibility runs out, the benefit stops at the 10-year point. “Most veterans understand that, but life gets in the way.”

Reservists’ Montgomery GI Bill education benefits kick in when they make a six-year commitment and complete Active Duty training. The Reservist then has 14 years to use the benefit but eligibility expires if the reservist separates or retires.

The provisions for active duty personnel were established as a recruitment tool and a veteran’s benefit, whereas for Reservists the GI Bill is a recruitment tool, a way to help them pay for college while serving their country. This is more than a philosophical difference; it is a legislative one. Active Duty benefits are covered under Title 38 of the Montgomery GI Bill; Title 10 covers Selected Reserve benefits. This has resulted in disparate financing allocations and administration of the benefits.

The Reservists’ monetary benefit under the Montgomery GI Bill was initially set at 47 percent of the Active Duty benefit, a reflection of the respective duty obligations. Both amounts were pegged to the Consumer Price Index. In the 1990s, the rising cost of education had so far outstripped the CPI that Congress boosted increases in the Title 38 benefit. Since 2000, the rate has risen from $650 to the current $985 for full-time institutional training or college coursework. This is still almost 40 percent short of the average cost of a four-year college education today. Meanwhile, Title 10 was not addressed in these rate hikes. Still tied to the CPI, the Reservist benefit inched up from $272 in 2001 to $282 today. That is 29 percent of the Active Duty benefit—well below the 47 percent benchmark—and less than 20 percent of the average college costs.

Ironically, as the Reserves’ ratio of the benefit sank, their military role rose drastically since the Montgomery GI Bill became law in 1984, back before the Pentagon implemented its Total Force strategy. Rep. Sonny Montgomery did not foresee a day that reservists would make up nearly half of the total military manpower, that Reservists would comprise 40 percent of the force serving in an overseas combat theater, that Reservists would routinely be activated for up to a year of duty. Even without the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Reservists were destined to spend more time in training and Active Duty missions than they had in 1984.

Given the prominent role Reservists have played in the war on terror (320,000 total Guard and Reserve call-ups since September 2001), it’s hard not to argue they should be treated more fairly in terms of benefits. Yet, the Montgomery GI Bill itself works against them. Reservists must be activated beyond one full year to be eligible for the Title 38 benefits; the Department of Defense generally is limiting activations to 12 months. Though some Reservists are being called up for another yearlong tour of duty just weeks after their first tours end, because the activation is non-consecutive beyond 12 months those Reservists still are not eligible for the additional benefits.

Some members of Congress, along with MOAA, are trying to address this issue, attempting to amend the law so that Active Duty level benefits kick in when a Reservist accumulates an aggregate of 24 months’ activation. Another bill aims to bring the Reservist monetary benefit back to the 47 percent of Active Duty benefits level, and then peg both levels to a cost-of-education index determined by the U.S. Department of Education rather than the CPI. The most ambitious of pending legislation would raise the Montgomery GI Bill benefits to cover all educational costs, as the original World War II bill did.
 

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