Before last Friday, students juggling their involvement in the U.S. military with their academic careers had no official representation at the University. Now, veterans and active armed services personnel on campus have an officially recognized student group to call home.
The Veterans and Family Student Association (VFSA), which sought ASUO recognition for more than a year, has approximately 40 members and seeks to make sure that student veterans and their families receive support, said Kane Kim, the group’s director.
That’s often a tall order, the members are a diverse group.
“We come from many different majors, are involved in many other programs, and have different political views, but we all have a shared interest in making sure that vets and their families are taken care of,” Kim said.
Kim said he hopes the VFSA office’s grand opening, tentatively scheduled for Jan. 12, will be a success and set the tone for the rest of the year but the date may be changed because of construction delays.
The group, which will move into the EMU Cultural Forum’s space, is still working on recruiting more members by reaching out to student veterans and offering them a place to share their experiences.
For Shane Addis, a 23-year-old sophomore and member of the Marine Corps, joining the VFSA offered the hope of finding people that could relate to his experiences.
“The transition back to life in the U.S. is hard because friends continued their lives while I was gone and when you get back, you kind of feel like an outsider,” Addis said. “When you’re in Iraq, the high stress level is almost expected, and it’s hard for some vets to let that stress go when they come home.”
Most veterans have had different experiences that led them to the military.
Addis first attended the University in 2001, but found that even with financial aid he couldn’t afford school. He decided to give the Marines a try and began training in 2002. After going into active duty, Addis was sent to Iraq for eight months.
Christina Scotton, another student veteran involved with the VFSA, chose to enter the Army because she didn’t want to start college right after graduating from high school.
Scotton, 23, joined the Army in June 2001, and was deployed to Iraq for a one-year tour of duty in September 2003.
Karl Gunther, a 22-year-old University senior represents the next wave of veterans. Gunther, who has yet to go to Iraq, became involved in the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps his freshman year and is awaiting assignment.
Depending on the situation in Iraq in the next year and a half, Gunther said there is a good chance he will either be stationed in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Addis and Scotton both said that there is always some fear of death while in Iraq, but that soldiers learn how to deal with that angst and not let it consume their everyday lives.
Although Scotton had an office job and wasn’t ever directly in the line of fire, she said that the fear of dying was always in the back of her mind.
“You’re always afraid for your life because you never know when a bomb is going to come over the wall and hit you,” Scotton said. “It’s always in the back of your head, but you can’t think about it all the time or you won’t make it.”
Being a female soldier in Iraq had its moments of difficulty, but for the most part, she felt accepted, Scotton said. While there were some annoying confrontations with male soldiers, Scotton said she never dealt with any real sexual harassment.
“There were 40 girls and around 2,000 males,” Scotton said. “There were some general annoying things I dealt with, but the guys in our unit were really protective of us.”
Although Addis lost one of his mentors in Iraq and watched one of his close friends struggle with the stress of war after coming back home, he said that he believes he is dealing well with the transition back to civilian life.
“What I have realized is that you can be a Marine when you’re over there and a civilian when you’re in college. Different people have different traumas, but I am doing well.”
Although the country was a shock, he said he gained experience in the process.
“I’ve gotten a lot of things out of being in the military,” Addis said. “It’s paying for my school now, and it’s been hard at times, but I’ve gotten a lot of good experience.”
Blending college and military life, nevertheless, is not one of those experiences that battle prepares veterans for and it’s one of the challenges that the VFSA is trying to help veterans address. Student veterans can sometimes feel misunderstood and misrepresented.
Addis said that he also often feels unable to speak his mind about his military experience on campus. Living in a liberal community has often made him feel like an outcast and although his family has been supportive of his decision to join the military, some of his friends haven’t.
“You see all the protesters on campus saying ‘bring our troops home,’ and it’s kind of hard,” Addis said. “You don’t want to speak your voice when a whole community is against you.”
That powerless feeling was one of the reasons Addis got involved in the VFSA, and after attending one of the group’s meetings, Kim asked Addis to be the group’s spokesman. Addis said that his experience with the VFSA has been positive because of his shared passion for wanting equal opportunities for nontraditional students.
Students in the military often have to miss a week of school at a time, Addis said. “Then we have to come back and take a midterm that we are totally unprepared for, and we aren’t given any support. We aren’t set up to succeed, we’re set up to fail,” he said.
When Scotton returned to the U.S. in late 2004, she said that the adjustment was very difficult.
“It was hard to readjust to life in the States,” Scotton said. “It was different not to be worried all the time; because in Iraq you have to. It takes a while to get out of that mindset.”
After Scotton left active duty in 2005, she took a break before starting college. This fall she entered the University as a freshman and, like Addis, became involved with the VFSA in order to find a community that shared her military experience.
“I wanted to be in contact with people who have had some of the experiences I’ve had,” Scotton said. “I wanted to find a place where I could feel comfortable and where people understand what I went through and what I’m going through now.”
Gunther said his family, who has extensive experience in the military, has been a huge support for him. Although he knows that there are plenty of people on campus that dislike the military, Gunther said that he has never experienced any resentment or anger from fellow students.
When he heard about the VFSA, Gunther said he immediately wanted to be a part of it, even though he is not a veteran.
“I’m not a veteran but I can still help out,” Gunther said. “I may be in their shoes some day, so I might as well start helping now.”
One thing is uniform for these students: Their military involvement is ongoing.
Although Scotton’s term of duty doesn’t end until 2008, she said she is unsure whether she will have to go back to Iraq.
Addis still has a year and a half to go in his six-year contract with the Marines. For now, Addis said he is focusing on school and getting a degree. But he is unsure if he will remain involved with the military after graduation.
“When I get a degree, if I don’t have any options with business administration, then I will go into Officer Candidate School,” Addis said.
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