How much of my college will be paid for? Air National Guard? Please help?
I am considering joining the Air Guard. At the same time I want to go to this alternative school named Herzing College in Madison, Wisconsin. The tuition for the school is roughly $15,000 a year.
I am currently a resident of Illinois, so I will not receive the “Wisconsin Veterans Grant”.
Here are the specific benefits from the ANG website in Wisconsin:
Education Benefits 100% tuition reimbursement for up to 8 semesters or equivalent undergraduate study at any accredited college/vo-tech school. Payment may not exceed in-state tuition at UW-Madison.
Herzing College costs $7,000 more than UW-Madison. So do I have to pay for this? What about Tutition Assistance in the ANG?
Also, how can I even start to make sense of the GI Bill?
Thank you for your help!
One other thing, if I go to school full-time, would I still need to have a job to live and keep my apartment?
Yes, you are required to pick up the bill for anything over what UW- Madison costs….just comes with the territory of you choosing to attend a college that costs more per year than my entire 8 semesters of school(State University) cost me. My advice is to think about college some more, and why are you 100% set on spending so much going to school at this particular place? You can either get a full-ride from the ANG by going to a school where they cover all the tuition, or have 30K in loans when you are done by choosing the expensive school…your call, but from what I have seen at expensive private schools, their degree means nothing more than my state university degree, sometimes less as in my sisters case when she had to re-take 10 credit hours Oklahoma state would not accept from her $15,000/year private school.
The GI Bill seems hard to understand, but its easy to use. Once you are done with training(tech school), you will meet with your retention officer and get NOBE form (notice of basic eligibility), which shows taht you are qualified in your AFSC and able to now get your GI Bill. You turn this form into the registrars VA representative(every school has one) and they get your benefits going. It takes 90 day to get it going(get back pay of course), but from then you will receive the $679/month for GI Bill for every month you are enrolled in 12 credit hours or more. Mix in $180 take home from drill weekends each month, and you can take home about $900/month for working two days a month. If you get a sign-on bonus, currently $20,000 for select jobs, then you can use this money to pay for what you like also. You get 10K at the completion of training, and 10K at your 3 year mark in your 6 year enlistment. It is up to you and how much bills you have to not have to have a job other than the ANG while going to school. I did not have to, the ANG gave me enough to get by(working summers/spring break/Christmas break when not in school with the ANG also, making money for school year).
Bottom line, the ANG is college-centric and it is as good as it sounds.
Email me through my profile on here for more info, be glad to help you out, I know people in the Madison unit I could have you talk with….
