VA Loan Updates

Joseph Nannery of Fremont served eight years as a Marine before enlisting in the National Guard in 2001, and in March 2004, he was deployed as an infantry squad leader to Iraq.

When he returned home in February 2005, it had been 16 years since he attended school.

Working full time as a project analyst for a green residential building contractor in Santa Clara, he attends Ohlone College at night to fulfill his undergraduate requirements. He hopes to pursue a degree in environmental studies at San Jose State University. He would like to then earn a law degree.

But Nannery found that the GI Bill, set up after World War II to help veterans pay for college, was falling short.

Now, Nannery, 35, is getting some financial help from the Fund for Veterans’ Education. Started with $8 million from New York financier and World War II veteran Jerome Kohlberg, the fund has pledged to send 96 veterans to college.

Nannery, along with Evan Aanerud of San Luis Obispo, another scholarship recipient, will be feted today in a ceremony at the downtown Marriott hotel in San Francisco.

“It’s going to enable me to continue going to school,” Nannery said. “I’m trying to avoid taking out loans and spending my future income before I have a future income.”

Several senators have called for increasing education funding in the GI Bill, but benefit levels remain at 1980’s Cold War levels.

“The Department of Defense budget for recruiting is $4 billion a year to put out the message the military will pay for college,” said Fund for Veterans’ Education Director Matthew Boulay. “That was true in 1944, but as funding has melted away, it’s not the case anymore. If we are sending these young men and women into combat, then it’s our duty to help them transition into civilian life.”

It’s a math problem. Young men and women returning from duty in Iraq or Afghanistan receive $1,101 a month in benefits - or $440 if they served in the National Guard or the Reserves.

The National Center for Education Statistics says the average cost of tuition, fees, room and board at a public institution was more than $12,000 in 2005/2006, and the cost at a private four-year institution was more than $27,000.

“A lot of vets come out of the service thinking the GI Bill is going to pay for everything and it doesn’t, and they get discouraged and end up not going to school,” Nannery said.

More than 1,200 veterans applied for scholarships from the fund, which promises to pay the gap between military benefits and university costs. Recipients were chosen from every state and the District of Columbia, based strictly on need.

Fund leaders want to pass out 1,000 scholarships over the next three years. They will need to raise an additional $8 million to reach their goal, Boulay said.

Applicants can be active military members, reservists or members of the National Guard, and can use the money for all kinds of schools: two-year, four-year, private and vocational. The fund will ensure the students’ entire tuition is covered until they graduate.

Aanerud, a former Marine, will use his scholarship to further his studies in industrial technology at California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo.

Nannery said he researched scholarships, but many target particular groups - and not usually young men. “Being a veteran, it’s hard to get that money,” he said. Nannery found out about the Fund for Veterans’ Education when his platoon sergeant sent him an e-mail about it.

The scholarship, Nannery said, “alleviates a lot of the financial stress.”

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