Veterans awaiting GI Bill turn to loans, parents
COCONUT CREEK, Fla. — Brandon Thomas was hit by shrapnel from a rocket-propelled grenade and twice grazed by bullets fired by the Taliban during his final tour with the Army in Afghanistan.
After risking his life, the 27-year-old father and Purple Heart recipient is one of thousands of veterans who now say they are waiting weeks or months for education benefits under a newly fattened GI Bill, leaving many to scrape up money from family or take loans to cover college costs while the Department of Veterans Affairs pledges to speed up payments.
The Post 9/11 GI Bill is the most significant expansion of education benefits since the original GI Bill in 1944. Eligible veterans receive payments for tuition, housing and a book stipend. The VA says more than 50,000 veterans and their relatives have given notice that they’re enrolled in college for the fall semester and hoping to be reimbursed under the program, which started making payments in August.
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