Vermont National Guard urges House Committee to make tuition-benefit expansions permanent

The Vermont National Guard told the House Education Committee on May 15 that the state’s tuition-benefit program, introduced for the 2018 academic year, has become an important recruiting and retention tool and that recent expansions allowing a second bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree should be made permanent.

“...the Vermont National Guard Tuition Benefit Program, which has been in existence since 2018, is really one of the best state packages,” Brigadier General Hank Harder, Deputy Adjutant General for the Vermont National Guard, told the committee. Harder said the program supports both military professional development and members’ civilian education and careers.

Harder told lawmakers the program has seen steady growth in use since its inception. He said 107 service members used the benefit in the 2022–23 academic year and 108 in 2023–24. Harder also described growth in the newly added master’s-degree option: “In academic year 2022–23, seven of our soldiers and airmen took advantage of that. And then the very next year, academic year 2023–24, 18 folks were enrolled in the master’s program,” he said.

The master’s and second-bachelor’s provisions were added by the 2022 legislative action Harder identified as Act 140; he said those additions will expire at the end of the current legislative session in June unless the Legislature acts. Harder urged the committee to keep those options in the program so they remain “an enduring tool” for Guard members.

Committee members asked about program cost, residency, and out-of-state enrollments. Harder said the program’s appropriation to date has been “about $1.3 million” and that the Guard does not currently expect a supplemental appropriation but would return to the Legislature if increased funding becomes necessary. He said the majority of participants are Vermont residents and that detailed residency and institution breakdowns can be provided later by staff.

Harder and committee members also discussed the program’s flexibility for training not offered in state schools. Harder noted examples of members attending programs at institutions outside Vermont, saying the ability to use out-of-state programs when an in-state option is unavailable has been “very helpful.”

No formal vote or committee action on the bill occurred at the hearing; lawmakers and Guard leadership discussed the program ahead of the miscellaneous education bill’s return to the House from the Senate. Harder said he and other subject-matter experts will be available when the bill returns.

The committee heard the presentation at a May 15 meeting of the House Education Committee that began at 12:30 p.m. The tuition-benefit expansions added in 2022 are scheduled to sunset at the end of the legislative session in June unless the Legislature retains them.