National group notes resources, support found on top campuses
G.I. Jobs has announced its 2011 list of Military Friendly Schools in the U.S. One of their top schools in the study was Kirkwood Community College. The Cedar Rapids based two-year college reports more than 800 student-veterans enrolled for college credit classes in the past academic year, and another strong year about to start.
The veterans-focused publisher honors the top 15 percent of colleges, universities and trade schools they believe are “doing the most to embrace America’s veterans as students.”
Kirkwood is among many community colleges seeing a rise in veterans registered for classes in the past year. College officials noted more than 800 former military service members who took classes in the 2009-10 academic year.
Vice President of Enrollment Services Kristie Fisher noted the national publisher’s criteria for the citation “speaks to the service and mission” inherent at Kirkwood.
“We are honored for this renewed recommendation and appreciate the vote of confidence reflected in this distinction. The credit belongs to Vicki Terronez, our veterans educational liaison. She is completely dedicated to helping our student-veterans adjust not only to the rigors of college life, and also to finding ways to help them adjust to the different dynamics of civilian life, too,” Fisher observed.
Terronez credited the “top-notch bunch of people” that characterize the student-veterans choosing Kirkwood for their post-service education. “Early in the year we thought our enrollment would go down with more than three thousand National Guard members mobilizing for overseas duty. To the contrary, our veterans numbers continue to grow. This is a remarkable bunch of people to work with, a joy to serve them,” Terronez said.
Support services at Kirkwood include a dedicated Veterans Lounge area in Iowa Hall. This room was created in 2008 to provide a special spot for former military personnel to socialize, study and access veteran-specific resources and information as needed.
Two other eastern Iowa Corridor colleges made this year’s G.I. Jobs list: Cornell College in Mount Vernon and The University of Iowa.
Schools on the list range from state universities and private colleges to community colleges and trade schools. The common bond is their shared priority of recruiting students with military experience.
Schools on the Military Friendly Schools list also offer additional benefits to student veterans such as on-campus veterans programs, credit for service, military spouse programs and more.
Criteria for making the Military Friendly Schools list included efforts to recruit and retain military and veteran students, results in recruiting military and veteran students and academic accreditations. The complete list of American colleges credited as Military Friendly Schools is found on the publisher’s website:
www.militaryfriendlyschools.com/2011list.
The list was compiled through exhaustive research starting last April during which G.I. Jobs polled more than 7,000 schools nationwide. A full list of board members can be found at
http://militaryfriendlyschools.com/Article/advisory-board/
The newly redesigned website, found at www.militaryfriendlyschools.com, features interactive tools and search functionality to assist military veterans in choosing schools that best meet their personal educational needs. The site currently shows 2010 Military Friendly Schools but will switch to the 2011 list in late September.
ABOUT G.I. Jobs
G.I. Jobs (www.gijobs.com) is published by Victory Media, a veteran-owned business which also publishes The Guide to Military Friendly Schools, Military Spouse and Vetrepreneur magazines and annually rates the nation’s “Military Friendly Employers,” “Military Spouse Friendly Employers” and “Best Corporations for Veteran-Owned Businesses.”