ARLINGTON, Va. – Recent changes to Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits will allow more Guard members greater time in which to use those education benefits, said National Guard Bureau officials.
"Some of these changes are going to add categories of eligibility," said Ken Hardy, chief of the Education Services Branch at the NGB. "This is going to affect thousands of Soldiers [and Airmen]."
Signed into law in August, one of the biggest changes enacted in the "Forever GI Bill" is that beneficiaries are no longer required to use their benefits within 15 years of their last qualifying period of active duty service.
"That's why it's called the forever GI Bill," said Hardy, adding that it's not a new GI Bill, but simply changes to the Post-9/11 GI Bill. "Basically, your GI Bill no longer expires, as long as your last period of active duty was on or after Jan. 1, 2013."
Additionally, Guard members who took part in the Reserve Education Assistance Program — an education benefit for reserve component members that ended in 2015 – may now convert any unused REAP time to the GI Bill.
"Soldiers [and Airmen] who had used REAP before but weren't using REAP when it ended weren't eligible to transfer that entitlement to the Post-9/11 GI Bill," said Hardy, adding that under the new law, those Guard members are now eligible.
"Now, the Soldiers and Airmen who lost that [benefit] are allowed to apply their remaining months of REAP to the Post-9/11 GI Bill, " Hardy said.
With the new GI Bill changes, Guard members also start out at a higher benefit tier.
Under the previous rules, after 90 days of qualifying service the GI Bill covered 40 percent of tuition, books and supplies and a housing allowance. At six months of qualifying service that was bumped to 50 percent, with an additional 10 percent added for each period of six months. Now, eligible Soldiers and Airmen start out at the 50 percent tier.
"At six months [of qualifying service] you'll go to 60 percent and that will stay until you hit 18 months and from there the rest of the tiers stay the same," said Don Sutton, the GI Bill program manager at the NGB.
Many Guard members already qualify for the 50 percent tier.
"Most Guard members are at the 50 or 60 percent tier because they have one deployment that is either just under or just over 12 months," said Sutton.
Additional changes are scheduled to take place next year, including changes to the transfer of education benefits.
"One of the things that [is scheduled to] change is being able to transfer benefits when a dependent is deceased," said Sutton, describing a situation where a service member passed his GI Bill benefits to his daughter, a high school senior who was killed in a car accident before she could use those benefits.
"He couldn't take those benefits and give them to another one of his children," said Sutton. "This law changes that. In cases like that, the transferring parent [will be able to] transfer benefits to other dependents if the original dependent is deceased."
Additionally, said Sutton, the scheduled change will also allow dependents who have been given benefits to transfer them to other dependents.
"There is a provision that if the dependent has benefits and the sponsor passes away, that dependent can move the benefits they had to other dependents," said Sutton, who stressed those changes aren't scheduled to go into effect until August 2018.
However, the recent changes currently in effect were made to allow Guard members greater access to earned benefits, he said.
"This is a way to equal the playing field," said Sutton. "It gives those who earned the benefits a greater chance to use them."