Kevin Eagan - Student Veteran Data in Higher Education: New Directions for Institutional Research, Number 171

Student Veteran Data in Higher Education

Kevin Eagan, Lesley McBain, and Kevin C. Jones (eds.)

New Directions for Institutional Research, no. 171

Editor: Gloria Crisp

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THE ASSOCIATION FOR INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH (AIR) is the world's largest professional association for institutional researchers. The organization provides educational resources, best practices, and professional development opportunities for more than 4,000 members. Its primary purpose is to support members in the process of collecting, analyzing, and converting data into information that supports decision making in higher education.

The passage of the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act of 2008, commonly known as the Post-9/11 G.I. Bill, created a surge in student veteran enrollment at colleges and universities across the United States. This was due to the bill's unprecedented educational benefits for qualifying veterans who served after September 10, 2001: in-state tuition and fees, a housing allowance, a book stipend, and an additional provision for voluntary matching funds agreements between institutions and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to defray the cost of either out-of-state or private institutions tuition and fees. In addition, a new provision authorized qualifying servicemembers to transfer their Post-9/11 G.I. Bill benefits to dependents. The bill's passage has also created keen interest by various stakeholders (including but not limited to Congressional committees, veteran advocacy groups, and colleges and universities themselves) in how the billions of federal dollars authorized by the Post-9/11 G.I. Bill are being spent. This has led to increased scrutiny of, and requests for, data and research on student veterans.

However, although student veterans have been part of higher education for many decades, and The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 (the original G.I. Bill) is well-known as a watershed in higher education history, higher education researchers have not historically focused on them. This means that military-affiliated students (a term encompassing not only student veterans, but active-duty military studying in off-hours and dependents eligible for transferred benefits under the Post-9/11 G.I. Bill) have not historically been the subjects of large-scale postsecondary educational data collections. Further, these students characteristics have changed as the U.S. military has changed since the first G.I. Bill in 1944. Thus the study of military-affiliated students is unfamiliar terrain for most higher education researchers who do not possess a significant background in military affairs.