Understanding the Need for Veteran
Learning Communities
• Paul Grossman, Hastings College of Law
[email protected]
• Sandra Burnett, Santa Monica College
[email protected]
• Wayne K. Miller, II
[email protected]
• Mary Lee Vance, University of Montana
[email protected]
1
“[L]et us strive on to finish the work we
are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to
care for him who shall have borne the
battle….”
Abraham Lincoln
Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865
2
Outline
• Veterans and Wounded Warriors
Assets, Challenges and Best Practices
• Veterans: Collaboration for Successful Transition
• Essential Practices in Student Veterans Programs:
Serving Veterans and Veterans with Disabilities in
Higher Education: A Delphi Study
• Building Process for a Learning Community or
VETS Office
• Q/A
3
Veterans and Wounded Warriors
Assets, Challenges and Best Practices
AHEAD 2011
Seattle
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The Engine Behind the Surge:
The New GI Bill
“The Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act”
– Up to 4 years of full support after 36 months post-9/11
active duty (sliding amount depending on length of service)
– Can Include:
• Tuition (up to highest public college tuition)
• Books, fees
• Housing stipend
• Tutoring expenses
• Licensing expenses
– More information is available from the VA GI Bill
website, http://www.gibill.va.gov/
5
Assets Veterans/Service
Members Bring With Them
•
•
•
•
Cultural, racial, ethnic diversity
Maturity: in terms of both age and experience
A mission/goal accomplishing orientation
Trained for leadership/experienced in leadership:
– Within diversity
– Within chaos with life and death consequences
Sven Jones, retired US Army Company Commander and Training Officer//Founder of the Institute for Learning & Understanding,
“Understanding Military Culture,” AHEAD, July 2009
Of our 44 U.S. Presidents, only 12 have not had military
experience. Twelve of our Presidents were generals, including
Washington and Eisenhower.
6
Assets That Can Also be Liabilities
• Cohort/team oriented- they tend to connect with one another
more than with non-service members/veterans
• Do not like to ask for help from others and want to be selfsufficient
• Well-trained in critical-thinking, even in difficult circumstances,
but not experienced at independently taking care of basic
bureaucratic responsibilities like registering for class:
”It would be a great help to not just be thrown into college. All the
paperwork and what not that I have to go through. I’m probably
eligible for things I am not aware of….[T]hey just tossed a piece of
paper at me…. That does not help.”
Robert Ackerman et al., Transitions: Combat Veterans as College Students, in
Creating a Veteran-Friendly Campus: Strategies for Transition to Success,
(Ackerman & David DiRamio eds., Summer 2009).
7
The Challenge
• Ensure that veterans, service members, and
wounded warriors come to college, transition
and persist, in light of
– College representing a new culture for everyone
– Immersion in military culture
– Repeated exposure to a traumatic asymmetrical war
“In asymmetrical warfare, battles are fought largely in civilian population with
soldiers fighting an enemy often shielded by civilian populations.” The Untold War
– Newly acquired status as a “wounded warrior”
– Potential collapse of familial supports
8
Common Causes of the Transition Challenge
for All Vets and Service Members
•
•
•
•
Sense of purpose to purposelessness
No more mission or a very much less critical one
From high structure where ever minute is scheduled to low structure and little
schedule
High stressors to lesser stressors, hard to let go of the high ones and focus on the
lesser ones
• Adverse or hostile attitudes toward war that imply hostility to vets and service
members
•
•
•
Uncertainty about recovery
Sexism and racism are not permitted---sexism and racism are accepted to the
degree protected by the First Amendment
Everyone is prepared for the mission, some students are prepared, some are not.
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Deliberate Steps Do
Make a Difference
• 66% of all non-veterans will attend some college—29% of all
non-veterans will attain at least a BA vs. 41% - 15%,
respectively.
Educating Veterans in the 21st Century, Hermann, Hopkins, Wilson & Allen, 2009, p.7.
• US Dept. of Education numbers are even more disparate. ED
estimates only 3% of vets earn a BA in four to five years.
• At San Diego State University, a veteran friendly campus,
veterans, service members, wounded warriors have a 7.5
percentage point lower non-completion rate and a GPA .21
points above their undergraduate peers.
• Business as usual will not work--- Perfect Storm, JPED
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“Wounded Warriors”
• A large part of the vet/service member pool
• A group whose needs must be
addressed to have a “veteran-friendly
campus.”
• Individuals with distinct legal rights
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“Wounded Warriors—Signature Wounds”
• A variety of sources indicate that significant number of
services members returning from OIF/OEF will have visible
and non-visible impairments. Sources vary, but they include
20-50% for PTSD, TBI and/or depression. Other common
injuries include combat eye trauma (13% by one estimate);
amputations (6% by one estimate); blast-related hearing and
burn injuries.
• Impaired hearing may be the single most prevalent injury
• Many individuals will be sufficiently limited in major life
activities such as walking, seeing, thinking, concentrating, or
learning that the Wounded Warrior qualifies as an “individual
with disability” under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act
and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act, as
amended by the ADAAA of 2008—two disability rights laws
enforced by OCR.
12
Key Considerations for
Wounded Warriors
• They often are:
– New to their disabilities, without prior history
of IDEA/Sec. 504 eligibility
– Unaware of rights and procedures
– Unaware of how to overcome barriers
– Lacking information from high school about
disability or accommodations and may not be
likely to acquire information through traditional
means like a student handbook
13
More Key Considerations for
Wounded Warriors
• Psychological processes for accepting
disability status may take time
• Given their military background, some
warriors may equate disability with
“weakness”
• Their documentation of disability may not
meet the needs of higher education in
identifying appropriate accommodations
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A Lethal Mix of Challenges?
•
Historically, the suicide rates have been lower in the military than in the general
population. With the continued wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, however, military suicide
rates have been increasing and surpassing the rates for society at large. HOWEVER, in
2009, researchers found that male veterans were twice as likely to die of suicide as male
non-veterans in the general population.
--Suicide in the Military. Center for Deployment Psychology, 2010.
•
The suicide risk is further increased for veterans diagnosed with a selected mental
disorder, such as PTSD or TBI.
-- Risk of Suicide Among US Veterans After Returning From the Iraq or Afghanistan War
Zones. Journal of the American Medical Association, 2008.
•
These numbers do not include the high numbers of suicide attempts among veterans. In
fiscal year 2009 alone, there were 1,621 suicide attempts by men and 247 suicide
attempts by women who served in Iraq or Afghanistan, with 94 men and 4 women
dying.
--18 Veterans Commit Suicide Each Day. Army Times, 2010.
15
Critical Contact Information
• VA Suicide Prevention Hotline:
1-800-273 TALK (press 1 for veterans)
• www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org
• Best overall veterans’ assistance:
1-877-WARVETS
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A Challenging Transition
For all the reasons presented earlier,
transitioning from military to student life
can be a very challenging adjustment.
Throw simultaneously adjusting to disability
and the challenge can seem overwhelming.
What May It Take for Colleges to
Attract, Retain, and Graduate
Wounded Warriors ?
Examples of promising practices
collected from colleges and
universities
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What May It Take?
• An understanding by faculty and administrators of
what distinguishes Wounded Warriors from other
students, even other students with disabilities.
• Plans and actions well-calculated to address what
makes them unique. Suggested actions include:
– Faculty in-servicing about the signature wounds and
disabilities of OIF/OEF
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What May It take?
• Another suggested “promising practice”:
– A campus-wide interdisciplinary committee to address
the needs of veterans, service members, and wounded
warriors including: DSO, VSO, advising, counseling,
student health, academic deans, curriculum
development, campus security, student discipline, drug
and alcohol abuse programs, housing, physical
education, athletic and entertainment events services,
recreation and intramural sports, on-line learning,
technology acquisition, adaptive technology, campus
transit, and grounds/facilities maintenance
20
What May It take?
• Policy and service review with regard to:
– requesting the removal of program access barriers
– requesting and documenting the need for
accommodations
– adding, dropping, and withdrawing from classes
– bringing on campus personal attendants
– discipline
– drug and alcohol abuse
– suicide prevention
– use and control of service animals
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What May It Take?
• Veteran-centric programs
– A veteran/service member/wounded warrior-based
focus group to help identify how the campus can
welcome and support such students
– A new student orientation run by and for
veterans/service members/wounded warriors
– Athletic/strength training activities for veterans,
service members and wounded warriors
22
What May It Take?
– A clear, comprehensive, point of contact for all
types of veterans and service members, as a
“portal,” or as a “one stop shop” through which
veterans may resolve common administrative tasks
like course registration, housing registration, GI
bill benefit registration
– Academic credit to veterans, service members and
wounded warriors for military experience
23
What May It Take?
• Places where service members and veterans, including
wounded warriors can congregate and support one
another --- vets’ house, center, fraternity, etc., to
enable these individuals:
•
•
•
•
•
to network with their peers
to advocate for better policies and practices on campus
to engage in social interaction instead of isolation
to emerge as campus leaders
to eventually create and implement their own programs
24
What May It Take?
More vet–centric promising practice programs:
– Late registration and late drop privileges for
veterans/service members/wounded warriors
– Campus events honoring veterans
– Housing programs that allow veterans/service
members/wounded warriors to pair up as
roommates/floor mates and contain vet-centric
counselors
25
What May It Take? (cont.)
• Revision of DSS services:
– An opportunity to lead other campus components in
preparing for wounded warriors
– New name/location that is more “vet-friendly”; e.g.,
Access Services
– Adoption of vet-centric outreach through channels of
communication veterans/service members and
wounded warriors are likely to use like VA county
service centers, on-campus veterans’ service office,
veterans’ web-sites and social network sites.
26
What May It Take? (cont.)
• Off campus outreach by a campus team to:
• Local VA medical center/polytrauma center
• Local military base transition programs, training officers and
family assistance centers
• Veterans’ Assistance Centers
• Mental health services
• Drug and alcohol abuse services
• Suicide prevention programs
• Local Vocational Rehabilitation Office
• U.S. Department of Labor’s Transition Assistance Program
vendor, such as an employment development agency
• Governors’ programs
27
Video:
Tammy Duckworth’s Closing
Remarks
Video Clips Courtesy of
George Washington University
The nation that makes a great distinction
between its scholars and its warriors will
have its thinking done by cowards and its
fighting done by fools.
Thucydides
History of the Peloponnesian War , 431 BC
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Veterans: Collaboration for
Successful Transition
Sandi Burnett
Santa Monica College
Re-tooling in Tough Economic
Times
•
•
•
•
No added $$$$$
Shrinking staff and resources
Doing more with less
Sound familiar?
Regional Players
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
College Disability Services
College Veterans Resource Centers (VRC)
Veterans Affairs/ VBA (Chap 31, 33)
VA Medical Centers
County Veterans Offices
Private Non-profits
Last but Not Least, student veterans
Cross Training
•
•
•
•
•
Invite for a face-to-face meet-up
Identify information gaps
Identify best practices
Identify mutual support mechanisms
Schedule future opportunities
Santa Monica College
•
•
•
•
•
•
College-wide Committee
Regional Committee
Transition course
VRC/ High Tech Center support
Student Veterans Club
Dedicated academic counselor and VA
Work Study students
Essential practices in student veterans
programs: Serving veterans and veterans
with disabilities in higher education: A
Delphi study
Preliminary Results
Wayne Miller, ABD
University of Connecticut
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller, ABD
35
Study Overview
Sample = 45 Institution's of higher education
• 18 responded for all 3 rounds of the study
• Respondents chose a level of essentiality
■ identified practices for student
veterans with disabilities
■ identified practices for student
veterans without disabilities
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller - ABD
36
Study Overview
• The choices were:
–
–
–
–
Not important with a value of 1
Somewhat important with a value of 2
Important with a value of 3
Essential with a value of 4
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller, ABD
37
Study Overview
• An essential practice was one which had a
Mean of 3.75 or greater
• At the end of the second round there were 11
practices that statistically could have qualified
as an essential practice
• There were few changes between the 2nd and
3rd rounds.
• 3rd and final round results identified 9 essential
practices
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller, ABD
38
Top Three Essential Practices ONLY for
Student Veterans with Disabilities
• Three
of the
most
essential
A.
Ensure
each
veteran
haspractice
access to full
applying
ONLY
to student veterans with
learning
opportunities.
are: is physical access to
B. disabilities
Ensure there
facilities.
C. Understanding the right veterans with
disabilities have under ADA and Section
504.
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller, ABD
39
Three essential practices applying to
both student veterans WITH and
WITHOUT disabilities
1.
Ensure
veteran
has access
• Three
of each
the most
essential
practiceto full
learningONLY
opportunities.
applying
to student veterans with
2. disabilities
Provide a check
are: box on all admission
application forms for veterans to check.
3. Veterans are encouraged to talk and reach
out to support other veterans.
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne Miller, ABD
40
What can you can do?
• Review you institutions Student
Veteran Program (if you have one).
• Work with the AHEAD Veterans SIG
to develop a plan for implementing all
of the essential practices.
AHEAD 2011 - University of Connecticut - Wayne
Miller, ABD
41
Beginning the Building Process
Mary Lee Vance, Ph.D.
Director
Disability Student Services
The University of Montana
[email protected]
February 2, 2011
42
University of Montana
• Campus Exploratory Group
– VETS Office (Veterans Education Transition
Services)
– Recommended UM Committee
• UM Committee on Services for Veterans
– Provost and VPSA Executive Officer oversight
– Faculty, student (veterans), staff, community
43
Adjustments or
Accommodations?
Academic Adjustments
Faculty have the ability to determine what they teach, how they teach
and how they assess without compromising academic integrity. What
they do within their classroom, that is fair to all students, as laid out in
their syllabus, is their prerogative.
Academic Accommodations
Best practices have determined that there be a central office/person to
collect and assess documentation for the purposes of determining
reasonable accommodations. Accommodations range from classroom
adjustments, to whether or not a skunk qualifies as a therapy animal.
Adjustments for PTSD and TBI
• Have syllabus, and list of required texts as well as any
audio clips, finalized by registration
• Plan ahead to insure all audio clips, videos and movies are
captioned (many veterans have lost hearing functions, as
may have older students)
• Eliminate timed tests in favor of other assessment methods
that do not penalize students requiring extra time/lower
distraction testing accommodations and/or attendance
flexibility
• Describe in advance audio or other media, so students can
opt to leave the classroom if it might trigger PTSD
symptoms
More Adjustments for
PTSD and TBI
• Eliminate timed tests in favor of other assessment methods
that do not penalize students requiring extra time/lower
distraction testing accommodations and/or attendance
flexibility
• Allow students to be able to use an index card with
faculty-approved notes and/or build in memory joggers
into the exams (if exams are deemed necessary)
• Allow use of head-sets and/or dark glasses and/or earplugs
etc. to reduce distractions
• Allow use of head-sets and/or dark glasses and/or earplugs
etc. to reduce distractions during quizzes/exams
The Best Practice: Universal
Design
• No stigma for users, no reluctance by
veterans to engage in mitigating measures
• No need to deal with compliance questions
• A source of innovation in higher education
• A terrific opportunity to change “business
as usual” (teaching, assessment etc.)
47
Suggested Publications
• AHEAD – JPED Special Issue: Veterans with
Disabilities, Vol. 22, No. 1, 2009
• AHEAD - Veterans with Disabilities: Promoting
Success in Higher Education Thomas E. Church
• NACADA - M19: Advising Students with Disabilities:
Striving for Universal Success, 2nd ed. ISBN No. 978-1935140-19-1
• American Council on Education
–http://www.acenet.edu/Content/NavigationMenu/ProgramsS
ervices/MilitaryPrograms/serving/index.htm
48
Additional Publications
• Creating a Veteran-Friendly Campus: Strategies for
Transition and Success: New Directions for Student
Services, No. 126 (J-B SS Single Issue Student Services) Paperback (July 20, 2009) by Robert Ackerman and David
DiRamio
• Educating Veterans in the 21st Century by Douglas
Herrmann, Bert Allen, Roland B. Wilson, and Charles
Hopkins (Sep 18, 2009)
• Improving College Education of Veterans by Charles
Hopkins, Douglas Herrmann, Roland B Wilson, and Bert
Allen (Jul 8, 2010)
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Government Resources
• Students with Disabilities Preparing for Postsecondary
Education: Know Your Rights and Responsibilities,
http://www.ed.gov/ocr/transition.html
• Auxiliary Aids and Services for Students with
Disabilities, http://www.ed.gov/ocr/docs/auxaids.html
• “Dear Colleague” letter including announcement of the
Wounded Warriors Initiative and attaching “So You
Want to Go Back to School,” a document for wounded
warriors.
http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/back-toschool-2008.html
• http://www.gibill.va.gov/GI_Bill_Info/benefits.html
50