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Plan gives surviving children GI Bill benefits

Congress has created a new scholarship program for the children of service members who die on active duty that would give each child full Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits, just like someone who had served three years on active duty.

The new program is scheduled to take effect Aug. 1, the same launch date as the Post-9/11 GI Bill, and applies to the surviving children of anyone who died in the line of duty on active duty from Sept. 11, 2001, onward.

The new scholarship, included in the 2009 supplemental appropriations bill approved by congressional negotiators, is named the Fry Scholarship for Marine Gunnery Sgt. John David Fry, an explosive ordnance specialist killed in Iraq in 2006 who left behind three children.

For most of those eligible, the Fry scholarship will be more generous than the Survivors and Dependents Education Program, known as DEA. It will be similar, but also more generous in some cases, than Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits transferred to family members under an option in that new program.

The DEA program has a maximum monthly payment of $915, which in many cases will be far less than the tuition and fees, living stipend and book allowance available under Fry scholarships.

The new provision will give each qualifying dependent child a full 36 months of benefits. Under the regular family transfer rules in the Post-9/11 GI Bill, service members can transfer only their own 36 months of benefits, and must split the benefits if they share them with more than one family member.

Also, surviving children may use benefits until age 33, described in the bill as 15 years from their 18th birthday. The Post-9/11 GI Bill cuts off payments to children at age 26.

Surviving children will be eligible for full tuition and fees, up to the cost of attending the most expensive four-year public college or university in the state where they are enrolled, plus a monthly stipend and book allowance if they meet the same enrollment and course load requirements as veterans.

The book allowance, paid based on the number of credit hours taken, is up to $1,000 a year. The monthly living stipend is based on the military housing allowance for the ZIP code where the school is located.

Starting points

The college benefits for children of service members who die on active duty would take effect Aug. 1, the same day the Post-9/11 GI Bill takes effect. Because this is a last-minute addition to the sweeping new education benefits program, the bill would give the Veterans Affairs Department until Aug. 1, 2010, to create a process for applying for Fry scholarships and promised retroactive payments for children who use the benefits between Aug. 1, 2009, and Aug. 1, 2010.