Military recruiting traditionally has relied on two things-personal recruiting and inducements. The best recruiters were family and friends who had served. And the best inducement has always been education. But, because of downsizing in the 1990s, we have a smaller career force—and many of those who left the service left embittered. And while the Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB) is better than its predecessor, the Voluntary Educational Assistance Program, it is not keeping pace with rising college costs.
A solution to both problems may be lashing the two concepts together—allowing a family member to pass his/her GI Bill benefits to a son, daughter, niece, or nephew who joins the service, to double their college payout.
As the Navy began to drop in size from 600 to its current strength of 281 ships, it used some very good programs to draw down, such as the Variable Separation Incentive (annuity) and the Selective Separation Bonus (lump sum) buyouts of service members and a selective early retirement program. But the Navy also used mandatory early retirement and subsequent involuntary separations. Career-minded members with excellent records were being forced out of the service owing to nothing but numbers. A generation of service members left the Navy with many vowing never to let their kids join. Recruiting suffered year after year.
The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 resulted in a patriotic upsurge, and a new generation of Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines has joined the military. But numbers are falling off, and to counter this, the military is touting education and benefits and offering staggeringly large re-enlistment bonuses. But many of our best recruiters, the service members downsized in the 1990s, who are parents of teenagers today, may not be as willing to recommend the service to their sons and daughters.
How do we get the downsized parents of the 1990s to come back into the fold and recommend the service they loved to their children?
The GI Bill is a popular education benefit, but it has changed significantly since the immediate post-World War II era. For a $ 1,200 investment by a service member, up to $36,000 in educational benefits are available. This is a good start, but we can do better.
The Veterans Administration had toyed with the idea of allowing a service member to transfer his or her GI Bill to a spouse to strengthen the economy on the homefront. The goal was to make military families, especially enlisted families, more financially stable. But the idea stalled amid worries that a well-educated spouse might then have a higher paying career than his or her enlisted partner, and might actually prove an incentive to leave the service.
But what if we could improve recruiting and retention and at the same time improve educational benefits? Why not harness the magic of compounding by allowing a service member parent, aunt, or uncle, etc. transfer his or her MGIB benefits to a son or daughter who enlists?
For example, I bought into the MGIB when I left active duty and extended those benefits by another ten years when I was recalled after 9/11. I have until 2016 to use or lose my MGIB benefits.
I have a 16-year old son who will graduate high school in 2008. I hope he goes to college and on to a successful career, either in the military or private sector. But college is expensive and $36,000, while better than nothing, will barely pay in-state tuition at the University of Maryland, never mind books, room, board, and other expenses.
If my son wanted to enlist or join the Guard or Reserve, he could get the MGIB too. But if I could pass that benefit to a child who is joining the service to be added to their MGIB, those benefits could reach up to $72,000. Top-notch colleges and advanced programs would then be within reach. Compounded MGIB money could pay for undergraduate educations in nonscholarship ROTC programs and used in flexible and creative ways, making the educational benefits more powerful and attractive to recruits.
They say that the best military recruiters are military family members. That recruiting force was badly damaged during the downsizing of the 1990s. But by allowing the MGIB to be passed from senior service member to recruited family member, we can create a powerful tool to keep military families serving and help them pursue the American dream.
Commander Collins recently retired from the Navy Reserve. He is an emergency response manager and homeland security analyst for Maryland's Department of Transportation.