By BRENT MARTIN
A move is underway in Congress to address an apparent oversight: that members of the Air National Guard don’t benefit from the college tuition assistance offered members of the Army National Guard.
Northern Missouri Congressman, Sam Graves, sponsors bi-partisan legislation to address the discrepancy.
“If you join the Army National Guard, you get tuition assistance to go to college and a lot of members, or a lot of young people, join the Army Guard as a result of that,” Graves tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. “But Air National Guard, they don’t have that same opportunity. So, what this does is just make it the very same rules as the Army National Guard.”
Graves says he has no idea how the discrepancy developed.
He does know it has hurt recruitment efforts of the Air National Guard. That, he hopes, is soon to change.
“It’s going to be a big difference and that means the Air National Guard is going to be able to compete with Army National Guard on a level playing field,” according to Graves.
Graves has co-sponsored the legislation along with Congressmen Brad Finstad of Minnesota and Eric Sorenson of Illinois.
Under the legislation, federal college tuition assistance would be provided for drill status guard members of the Air National Guard, such as those stationed with the 139th Airlift Wing at Rosecrans Memorial Airport in St. Joseph.