Post 9/11 GI Bill This chapter of benefits is for service members and veterans who served at least 90 days on active duty excluding training after September 10th 2001. You can also qualify if you served a minimum of 30 days and got discharged with a service connected disability. Depending on how much time was served after this date determines what percentage you will be rated at. If you have been discharged from the military you must have an honorable discharge or one of three medical discharges, (EPTS) Existing Prior to Service, (HDSP) Hardship, or (CIWD) Condition Interfering with Duty to qualify.
Benefits Tuition and fees are paid directly to the school and will not surpass the schools in state tuition rate which is $99.06 per credit hour. Note that the tuition that the VA covers is not high enough to cover Valencia’s out of state tuition rate of $375.22 so it is very important to get classified as an in state resident through the school or you could financially be responsible for at least $276.16 per credit hour even if you are classified at a 100% for Chapter 33 benefits. Monthly Housing Allowance is paid directly to the student and equals the BAH rate for an E-5 with dependents no matter what your pay grade was or is with the military. That rate is $1329.00 and is calculated not by your zip code but the schools. BAH is now calculated by taking the amount of credits you are attending and dividing that number by the full time enrollment rate for that particular semester. For Fall and Spring the full time credit amount is 12 credits and for summer the VA considers 8 credits to be full time. Please remember that even though the VA lowers the credit requirement for summer down to 8 credits the school and Financial Aid still stay at 12 credits. The percentage you get when you divide these two numbers then should be rounded up or down to the nearest 10 %. This will be your BAH rate if you rate 100%. If your benefits are less than 100% you then calculate that percentage of your new BAH rate. *Note – You must be attending a minimum of 51% or more to be BAH eligible. This means if you are attending 7 credits in fall or spring or 6 credits in summer or anything less than that number you will NOT be BAH eligible. If you are in all Distance Learning Classes you will rate BAH at half of the National Average. If you want to know what that rate is you can contact the VA Regional Office. Example: If you are taking 10 credits in Fall (10/12 = .83333) this would be rounded down to 80% which is $1063.20. If your benefits are at 70% and you are taking 10 credits you would then figure 70% of $1063.20 which is $744.24.