Steps to apply for VA Ed Benefits

  1. Go to va.gov
  2. Under 'Explore VA benefits and health care' click on Education and training
  3. On the next page scroll down until you see 'How to apply for education benefits' and click
  4. On the next page scroll down to 'How do I apply' and click 'Apply for education benefits'
  5. You will be prompted to answer 4 questions - each appearing after answering the previous
  6. Click on “Apply Now” 
  7. After gathering the requested information, you will click 'Sign in to start your application'
  8. There are several options to sign in - Login.gov, Id.me or DS logon.  If you do not have one of these accounts you will need to create an account.
  9. From here to the end of the application, just fill out the required information
  10. At the end, click on submit and you are finished. It generally takes the VA about 30 days to process the application. 
  11. If you require assistance, contact the Veterans Center at military@kckcc.edu or call 913-288-7591.

The VA generally takes around 30 days to process an application. If you are approved for the benefit, you will receive a Certificate of Eligibility (COE) from the VA in the mail. For updates on processing times, you can contact the VA directly at 1-888-442-4551.

Every semester you want to use your VA Educational Benefits at KCKCC you will need to fill out the Veterans Benefits Request Form after you enroll in classes.  The form generates an email that is sent to the Veteran Certifying Specialist will then conduct a degree audit to ensure all the classes you are enrolled in are required for your degree.  If there are no issues, the Veteran Certifying Specialist who will submit the certification to the VA.  If there are issues, the Veteran Certifying Specialist will contact you through you school email account.

Regardless of when you make the change, all adds, drops, and withdrawals MUST be reported to the KCKCC Veteran Certifying Specialist immediately.  Depending on when you drop/withdraw from a course, you may owe money back to the VA.  We encourage you to speak with a Veteran Certifying Specialist before you make any schedule changes to see how this will affect your benefits.

 

If you have already been certified for the term you should not change your major until the end of the term.  Please contact the Military and Veterans Center with questions.  Anytime you are changing your major you will need to contact the Military and Veterans Center.  The Veterans Certifying Specialist changes the major with the VA.

Regular and Partial Payments

Once the VA has processed your certification, payments are made around the first of each month for the prior month's attendance. For example, you would receive a payment in September for attendance during the month of August.  Payments are made based on the number of days you were enrolled in classes for the previous month.  If classes started on the 22nd of August, you would be paid September 1st for 10 days, not the entire month.  Please note that under the following circumstances, you may receive only a partial payment: if you drop/add a course or courses and it affects your overall training time, you will be paid at your new training time rate.  Based on when you dropped/added a course, payments may not reflect the change until the following month. 

If you fail a course or receive an unsatisfactory grade (i.e. did not make the grade required by the academic department for degree credit), you may retake the course and receive VA Educational Benefits for the same course as needed.  Courses that are successfully completed may not be certified for VA purposes if they are repeated. VA will not pay benefits to repeat courses to enhance a student’s GPA therefore all other duplications cannot be certified. Please note that the VA will not pay for any associated Repeated Course Fees.

If you fail a course and the instructor has reported a last date of attendance (last date your logged on, attended, turned in work, etc) that information will need to be reported to the VA.  A debt will be incurred back to that last date of attendance and possibly back to the beginning of the term.  VA will calculate the debt against any stipend, housing allowance and tuition and fees (if applicable).  If you are receiving CH 33 - Post 9/11 any tuition and fees paid to the school will be adjusted and you will also incur a debt with the school.

If you enroll a class and it is later determined that the class you transferred to KCKCC counts as that class, the Veteran Certifying Specialist is required to adjust the certification that was submitted to reflect this.  This may result in the VA sending a debt letter to the student for the class and possibly for BAH payment.

To ensure you are paying the Military rate (in-state), send the Veterans Center a copy of your DD214 (Member copy 4) or a copy of your COE.  Spouses and dependents can also send us a copy of the service members DD214 with a copy of their driver’s licenses or a copy of their DEERS document.  For assistance contact the Veterans Center at military@kckcc.edu or 913-288-7591.