Published: Saturday, March 6, 2010
Ed benefit for military spouses on hold
BREMERTON — A military spouse education program serving 98,000 people has become too popular for its own good.
The Pentagon “paused” the year-old Military Spouse Career Advancement Accounts, after applications drained its budget and strained its administrators. The program provides tuition of up to $6,000 for spouses to train for careers that can endure frequent moves.
“Effective immediately, the MyCAA program is temporarily halting operations,” Military OneSource, the arm of the Department of Defense that runs the program, recently announced. “We are reviewing all procedures, financial assistance documents and the overall program.”
The spouses weren’t notified directly but through a posting on militaryonesource.com, said Air Force Lt. Col. April Cunningham, a Pentagon spokeswoman. They will be contacted directly if any changes are made as a result of the review, she said.
About 98,000 spouses have enrolled in the program or been approved for tuition assistance since it began in March 2009. Another 38,000 are in the pipeline, Cunningham said. The unadvertised program was doing fine, approving about 10,000 new applicants a month until January. Then it added 70,000 in January, and another 25,000 during the first 16 days of February, when the program was suspended.
No new applications are being accepted. Some spouses already in the program, like Erin Grayson of Bainbridge Island are in limbo.
Grayson, a Navy wife for more than 12 years, began studying for a master’s of divinity degree last fall at Seattle University, intending to become an ordained Presbyterian minister. MyCAA paid $3,000 for first-quarter classes. Grayson expected the remaining $3,000 to be applied to winter classes, which are nearing an end. Recently, she learned in a school e-mail that the money wouldn’t be available. There’s a stop on her account because the bill isn’t paid, and she can’t register for spring quarter until it’s taken care of.
“Now I have to pay for the courses I’m currently taking, which I didn’t anticipate, and I’m left scrambling to figure out what spring quarter will look like as well,” she said.
Grayson needs to find $3,000 somewhere, and quickly, to continue her studies.
“They’ve really left me in the lurch,” she said.
Grayson isn’t the only one who’s upset. Military spouses have set up a Facebook page called “Take Action Against MyCAA Shutdown,” which has 1,874 members. They’re furious that the program was shut down with little warning or explanation.
“The pause announced last week resulted from an unforeseen, unprecedented spike in enrollment,” Cunningham said. “January applications increased six-fold and it continued in February. These applications were overwhelming the system.”
Cunningham said she doesn’t know when the program will resume, but it will be “as soon as possible.”
The House of Representatives’ Military Family Caucus, led by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Spokane, plans to send a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Signatures were being collected this week.
“Like thousands of military families, I am frustrated by the Defense Department’s decision to suspend the MyCAA without warning, and by the DOD’s lack of responsiveness on when the program will return,” McMorris Rodgers said. “The stopping of this program and the confusion over its future has caused genuine hardship for America’s military families which need to be rectified. They deserve answers, and they deserve them promptly.”
The Pentagon “paused” the year-old Military Spouse Career Advancement Accounts, after applications drained its budget and strained its administrators. The program provides tuition of up to $6,000 for spouses to train for careers that can endure frequent moves.
“Effective immediately, the MyCAA program is temporarily halting operations,” Military OneSource, the arm of the Department of Defense that runs the program, recently announced. “We are reviewing all procedures, financial assistance documents and the overall program.”
The spouses weren’t notified directly but through a posting on militaryonesource.com, said Air Force Lt. Col. April Cunningham, a Pentagon spokeswoman. They will be contacted directly if any changes are made as a result of the review, she said.
About 98,000 spouses have enrolled in the program or been approved for tuition assistance since it began in March 2009. Another 38,000 are in the pipeline, Cunningham said. The unadvertised program was doing fine, approving about 10,000 new applicants a month until January. Then it added 70,000 in January, and another 25,000 during the first 16 days of February, when the program was suspended.
No new applications are being accepted. Some spouses already in the program, like Erin Grayson of Bainbridge Island are in limbo.
Grayson, a Navy wife for more than 12 years, began studying for a master’s of divinity degree last fall at Seattle University, intending to become an ordained Presbyterian minister. MyCAA paid $3,000 for first-quarter classes. Grayson expected the remaining $3,000 to be applied to winter classes, which are nearing an end. Recently, she learned in a school e-mail that the money wouldn’t be available. There’s a stop on her account because the bill isn’t paid, and she can’t register for spring quarter until it’s taken care of.
“Now I have to pay for the courses I’m currently taking, which I didn’t anticipate, and I’m left scrambling to figure out what spring quarter will look like as well,” she said.
Grayson needs to find $3,000 somewhere, and quickly, to continue her studies.
“They’ve really left me in the lurch,” she said.
Grayson isn’t the only one who’s upset. Military spouses have set up a Facebook page called “Take Action Against MyCAA Shutdown,” which has 1,874 members. They’re furious that the program was shut down with little warning or explanation.
“The pause announced last week resulted from an unforeseen, unprecedented spike in enrollment,” Cunningham said. “January applications increased six-fold and it continued in February. These applications were overwhelming the system.”
Cunningham said she doesn’t know when the program will resume, but it will be “as soon as possible.”
The House of Representatives’ Military Family Caucus, led by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Spokane, plans to send a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Signatures were being collected this week.
“Like thousands of military families, I am frustrated by the Defense Department’s decision to suspend the MyCAA without warning, and by the DOD’s lack of responsiveness on when the program will return,” McMorris Rodgers said. “The stopping of this program and the confusion over its future has caused genuine hardship for America’s military families which need to be rectified. They deserve answers, and they deserve them promptly.”
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