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Washington, DC - President Obama Announces New Actions to Ensure Service Members and Veterans Are Getting the Most Value out of Their Federal Education Benefits:

Over the past eight years, the President has worked to ensure that we are fulfilling our promises to all those who have served and protected our country. This means providing veterans the benefits they have earned, the health care that they need, and the resources and assistance to succeed when transitioning back to civilian life.

A central tenet of this promise is to make sure that we do all we can to ensure that our service members, veterans, and their families have the protections, resources, information, and support they need to pursue the American dream. Since the beginning of the Administration, the President has made a commitment to improve education outcomes for service members, veterans, and their family members. And that begins with enabling them to maximize their federal education benefits, including benefits provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) under the Post-9/11 GI Bill, the Department of Defense’s (DOD) Tuition Assistance Program, and the Department of Education’s (ED) Federal student aid programs.

The Obama Administration has delivered on that promise through actions that expand access to high-quality postsecondary opportunities for our Nation’s heroes. In 2012, President Obama announced the Principles of Excellence Executive Order, to ensure that veterans, service members, and their families have adequate information, support, and protections while using their federal education benefits. Since then, the Administration has made significant progress, with over 6,000 educational institutions signing on to provide access to information and increased oversight of programs. We have launched the GI Bill Comparison Tool, which has made it easier for over 1.3 million individuals to research educational institutions and training programs approved for the GI Bill and also compare educational institutions. The Post-9/11 GI Bill has provided nearly 1.7 million individuals with $68.9 billion in education benefits since its inception in 2009. The President signed legislation that expanded Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits eligibility criteria under the Marine Gunnery Sergeant John David Fry Scholarship to the surviving spouses and children of service members who died in the line of duty after September 10, 2001, and legislation requiring all 50 states, Washington D.C., and U.S. Territories to provide recently transitioning veterans and dependents in-state tuition rates at public institutions of higher learning – and now all 50 states are doing just that.

But there is more work to be done. That is why, on this Veterans Day, the President is announcing new measures to ensure that service members, veterans, and their families are treated fairly when they use their Federal education benefits. Building on the Principles of Excellence issued by the President and other executive actions, the Administration is expanding on these efforts by issuing a Presidential Memorandum that outlines additional steps, including:

Through these steps, the President is ensuring that the good work done by this Administration will carry forward for years to come, and that veterans, service members, and their families will have the tools they need to succeed in the economy of the 21st century.

Building on a Record of Progress

In addition to the actions announced Friday to strengthen education and training programs for those that have served our country, the Administration continues to take action to address the five core priorities that the President has set out for serving our veterans:

1.                  Health Care – Making sure veterans have timely and high-quality access to care

2.                  Benefits – Tackling the backlog of claims and modernizing the appeals process

3.                  Homelessness – Working to prevent and end veteran homelessness

4.                  Economic Opportunity – Fighting to give veterans every chance to enjoy the American Dream

5.                  Resources and Transformation at the VA – Making sure VA is serving every veteran

Over the past eight years, the Administration has made significant strides across each of these five pillars, and we are not letting up.  In conjunction with Veterans Day, the Administration is announcing three additional milestones that build on this record of success:

These efforts build on progress made across-the-board – cutting the backlog of initial disability claims by nearly 90 percent, increasing veterans’ access to health care, increasing the overall level of funding requested for VA benefits and programs by over 85 percent, and reducing the veteran unemployment rate by more than half. 

Moving forward, the Administration is committed to making sure this work carries on far into the future, ensuring that our nation upholds the sacred covenant made with those that have served this country.