New Tuition Award for Military Personnel, Veterans at University of Missouri

June 24th, 2015

COLUMBIA, Mo. ­— Today, University of Missouri Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin and Provost Garnett Stokes announced that MU will begin offering a 10 percent tuition award for all military personnel, veterans, their spouses and their children effective immediately. The award will reduce the amount of their base tuition and will apply toward a maximum of 150 hours of undergraduate credit and/or 75 hours of graduate credits toward a distance degree or certification program through Mizzou Online.

“We owe so much to those who are serving in our nation’s military as well as their families. We are honored that many of them choose to get their education through the University of Missouri,” Loftin said. “Although we cannot thank them enough, we hope this new award will be both an incentive and an aid as they enroll and work toward receiving a degree at Mizzou in their chosen fields.”

“Giving veterans this tuition break encourages them into accessible higher education, and this helps the veterans, their families and the Missouri economy,” said Larry Kay, Missouri Veterans Commission executive director. “Mizzou realizes how important veterans are to the future of our state and our nation and how productive they can be in the workforce.”

To qualify for the award, individuals must complete the following requirements:

• Be an active-duty service member, veteran with honorable discharge, national guard or reservist. Dependents of these military personnel also are eligible for the award.
• Be accepted to Mizzou as a degree-seeking undergraduate or graduate student who is working on a distance degree or certificate program through Mizzou Online.
• Maintain a 2.0 GPA.

Service members are eligible for state and federal educational benefits, yet many members of the Armed Forces and their families have exhausted their benefits or do not qualify for full tuition coverage, based on years of service and other branch-specific restrictions.

“Mizzou’s commitment to making higher education more accessible through online programs, a full-service Veterans Center and now this tuition assistance illustrates for veterans and their families that they have a place here,” said Carol Fleisher, director of the MU Veterans Center. “This tuition award will help those veterans, including their spouses and children, using the various forms of education assistance.”

“From my perspective, this is a tremendous offer from Mizzou that specifically benefits veterans, like me, who are using their Chapter 30 Montgomery GI Bill because it allows their benefits to go further,” said MU graduate student Joseph Osmack, who lives in Jacksonville, N.C., and chose Mizzou for the online master of public affairs program and organizational change certificate. “With the tuition award in place, I can apply the amount of my federal benefits that exceed my tuition toward classes that do not otherwise qualify for federal benefits.”

Editor’s note: For more information, please visit http://online.missouri.edu/militarytuition