Feeling like you fit in p1 - College Campus Life for Veterans - Military Times EDGE

Former Marine Lance Cpl. James Nelson admits ruefully that trading a rucksack for a backpack was not as easy as he thought it would be.

“I’m only out for one year, and I can’t stand civilian life,” said Nelson, an engineering student at Cleveland State University in Ohio.

He’d deployed to Iraq twice, in 2006 and 2007; by February 2009, he was ready to get out, get a degree, get a job.

As a student, one thing that drives him crazy is being distracted during class by other students answering their cell phones or playing on their laptops. “The teacher spends a lot of time yelling,” Nelson said. “I just get really mad.”

But he usually calms down in his English and math classes, where he doesn’t have to worry about “civilians doing their civilian thing” and can concentrate on concentrating. It’s a section made up only of veterans, organized by Supportive Education for the Returning Veteran.

SERV, a program developed by CSU chemistry professor John Schupp, aims to make college a familiar and welcoming place for veterans from Day One. Their application and registration fees are waived; Schupp shows them around campus and handles all their questions so they don’t get frustrated by the runaround of academia.

“When you’re in the military, you have a single person to talk to — your CO. He’s the one who solves the problem,” Schupp explained. “When you go to a campus, it’s not like that. It’s chaos.”

Once they’ve navigated the admissions process and the registrar’s office, students have the option of taking several gen-ed classes with their fellow veterans.

The vets-only classes are just one element of the SERV program, but they’ve attracted the attention of several schools across the country. Youngstown State University in Ohio, the University of Arizona and West Virginia University all incorporated similar classes into their veterans programs for the fall 2009 semester. And AMVETS, which pushed Congress to include $6 million for student veterans centers in the Education Department’s 2010 budget, is working with Schupp to promote the SERV model to even more schools.

Building a network

It’s a simple idea that can have a big payoff, Schupp said, because it taps into the strengths of military culture.

When a school sets out to develop a learning community, “you have to create camaraderie,” Schupp said. “You have lunches, retreats. This group has already done that. ... They want to be together. We have the busiest office on campus.”

The SERV office is not an elaborate space — just some chairs, a TV, a few computers. But “when I’m not at class or in the gym, I’m in the SERV office,” said former Marine Cpl. Steven Strodtbeck, who took the SERV biology class in fall 2009.

Hanging around with other guys, talking about his experiences — “It’s kind of like you’re back in the military,” he said.

More importantly, Schupp believes this camaraderie has a positive effect in the classroom.

Knowing they are surrounded by friendly forces, veterans can relax and focus on poetry or chemistry equations, he said. In his own SERV sections, he’s seen the class become a unit and the syllabus become a mission; buddy tutoring happens spontaneously.

“It’s just a more-disciplined, structured class,” Strodtbeck said of his biology section. “The instructor knows that we study and work hard ... so we have more time to go in depth.”

SERV classes have taught 168 students since spring 2008; 146 passed or are passing. That’s a pass rate of 87 percent — well above the average for freshmen in Ohio, Schupp said. SERV students’ average GPA is 3.09 in civilian classes and 3.42 in SERV classes. The average GPA of freshmen at CSU who are not part of any “learning community” is 2.59.

The classes at Youngstown State have been a success so far, said Jim Olive, director of the veterans program there.

“Professors say the students are arriving there early. They’re helping each other,” Olive said. “The psych professor has 68 percent of his students getting A’s and B’s, compared with 30 percent in a normal class.”

Strength in numbers

Schupp has no military background; he found himself drawn into veterans issues when a student veteran confided that she’d tried and failed to get through college several times.

Curious, Schupp started researching the challenges of transitioning from combat to college and was struck by the enormous success of the vets who used the first GI Bill after World War II, even though many were married with children and had not graduated from high school.

Schupp believes the sheer numbers of GIs on campuses across the country contributed to their success: Veterans were surrounded and helped by other veterans. He’s trying to re-create that atmosphere in a small way in the SERV classes and lounge at CSU.

While Schupp is inspired by the veterans of World War II, Olive is motivated by his college experience coming home from Vietnam.

“It was not an easy transition. There was no transition. It was a very tough experience,” he said. “We lost a lot of people — a lot of talent. We don’t want to do that again.”

Who benefits most

The SERV classes are optional, and Schupp acknowledges that not all student veterans want to take them, even if they need those credits. And because the only classes offered are basic requirements, all veterans need to take most of their classes with civilians. The point is not to isolate veterans in their own college-within-a-college, he said; the point is to help veterans who do feel isolated transition to university life.

Students who have no prior college experience benefit the most, Olive said. “They don’t know where to start. They don’t know where to go.” They don’t fit in with the freshmen “because they feel older and they are older. They may be only 22 or 23, but they’re way beyond in their life experience.”

SERV tries to turn that life experience into an advantage, not a barrier between them and other students.

“I looked at it as if you can go to Baghdad and bust down doors and kill bad guys, you can handle English 101,” Schupp said. “I focus on their strength, not their weakness. Bring them together. ... They are a strong unit. Just don’t try to separate them all the time or right away.”