Student Veterans’ Academic Performance Before and After the Post–9/11 GI Bill

• Published date: 01 January 2019
• Date: 01 January 2019
• DOI: 10.1177/0095327X17737283
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Student Veterans’

Academic Performance

Before and After the

Post–9/11 GI Bill

Amy Kate Bailey

1

, Madisen B. Drury

2

and Hannah Grandy

3

Abstract

This article uses student records from a nonselective public institution to assess

whether student veterans’ academic performance and preparation differed before

and after the post–9/11 GI Bill. We find equivalent ACT scores between cohorts

who were and were not eligible for this new funding source, suggesting similar

academic preparation. Grade point averages are also invariant across cohorts. We

identify a large decline in the probability that student veterans eligible for post–9/11

GI Bill funding pursue degrees in science, technology, engineering, and math dis-

ciplines. These results suggest that increased access to college funding had no effects

on academic performance and distributed student veterans more broadly across the

university curriculum, suggesting an important policy strategy to help recent vet-

erans successfully transition to the civilian labor market.

Keywords

veterans, public policy, sociology, higher education

1

Department of Sociology, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

2

Salt Lake County, Salt Lake City, UT, USA

3

University of Nevada at Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV, USA

Corresponding Author:

Amy Kate Bailey, Department of Sociology, Unive rsity of Illinois at Chicago, 1007 W. Harrison St .,

Behavioral Sciences Building 4112—M/C 312, Chicago, IL 60607, USA.

Email: akbailey@uic.edu

Armed Forces & Society

2019, Vol. 45(1) 101-121

ªThe Author(s) 2017

Article reuse guidelines:

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DOI: 10.1177/0095327X17737283

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Despite enthusiasm for “supporting the troops,” evidence indicates that many recent

veterans struggle for footing in the civilian labor market. Enhancing educational

certification may be one pathway to readjustment, but only if student veterans can

perform academically—a task which may be more difficult considering the chal-

lenges facing older students and those whose parents lack college education. Some

research suggests talented students underperform due to burdens associated with

financing a degree. A competing perspective identifies cultural capital deficits and

competing obligations that make working-class and older students less likely to

succeed in college. The public resources needed to provide universal college funding

may not make fiscal sense if veterans fail to achieve academically. Put simply, we

need to know whether lowering the drawbridge to college dilutes students’ prepara-

tion and performance, and if so, by how much? This question matters for recent

veterans if college success facilitates greater access to the civilian labor market.

The Post–9/11 GI Bill provides an opportunity to compare academic performance

among veterans with partial and universal funding. Under this legislation, nearly all

U.S. military personnel who spent 36 months on active duty since September 11,

2001, became retroactively eligible for generous educational benefits, expanding the

pool of subsidized veterans (Steele, Salcedo, & Cooley, 2010). The program pro-

vides full in-state tuition support as well as money for books and living expenses

calibrated to the local housing market. This approach stands in contrast to the

Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB), the program it replaced. The MGIB was an

employer-matching program, with comparatively modest and uniform baseline ben-

efits, available only to active duty personnel who elected to participate when they

enlisted, and more generous funding available to a smaller number of enlistees

meeting specifically defined merit-based criteria. Our project exploits this policy

shift, comparing academic preparation and performance of student veterans before

and after Post–9/11 GI Bill funding availability.

1

We utilize administrative records

from a nonselective public university, which we refer to as Mountain High Univer-

sity (MHU), and compare ACT scores and grade point averages (GPAs) for two

cohorts of student veterans.

Recent enlistment patterns make the veteran population reflective of the young

people most likely to benefit from expanded college funding policies. Military

academic and physical fitness admission criteria place even th e lowest aptitude

military personnel in the middle range of cognitive capacity. However, those who

join the armed forces are less likely than young people who go directly into college

to have parents who have completed a 4-year degree and also have lower academic

performance in high school (Bozick & DeLuca, 2011), suggesting that veterans may

experience cultural capital deficits that challenge college success. They also face

challenges shared with adult learners, including financial challenges, family pres-

sures, and difficulties navigating and finding a place in an unfamiliar institution

(Osam, Bergman, & Cumberland, 2017).

Our cohorts represent those who would have applied and been admitted to college

the year before the Post–9/11 GI Bill was adopted and who would have applied in the

102 Armed Forces & Society 45(1)