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My name is Bryan Adams I am a Purple Heart Veteran and the President of Veterans For Education at Rutgers University.  Our group is comprised of veterans from various backgrounds, branches of service, and career expectations.  The one thing we all have in common is the drive to achieve a college education.  When seeking a college education one of the biggest obstacles for veterans to overcome is the huge commitment of time and money which is required to obtain a degree.  Many returning veterans are older and more mature then the average college student, they usually have kids, a mortgage, and several years already invested into the military.  What these veterans need is a program which can save them precious time and money at every school in the State of New Jersey.   

The military offers a program known as “Servicemembers Opportunity College”.  This program would award college credits for specialized military training and occupational experience, and for learning in extra institutional and nonacademic settings.  Many occupations within the military require a great deal of technical training and occupational experience.  These courses are very labor intensive and may sometimes last up to a year.

“Servicemembers Opportunity College” or SOC is a consortium of over 1800 colleges and universities.  Institutions who are members of the SOC program allow for service members to complete a college degree while serving in the military.  SOC programs offer service members the opportunity to participate in distance learning programs such as correspondence courses and online courses in degree fields concurrent to their occupational specialty.  Service members can complete these courses while deployed to training missions or combat zones.   

Programs such as SOC may save service members up to two years of valuable time and thousands of dollars when they leave the military.  Service members would be able to leave the military with valuable credits towards their degree and in some cases an Associates degree.  SOC only exists in select universities within the State of New Jersey.  Many state schools do not support this program, the majority of the schools which participate are Community Colleges which have limited degree fields to choose from.  This leaves veterans with a tough choice, attend only those institutions which accept SOC credits or go the State University of their choice and begin with zero credits.   

We believe every State University in the State of New Jersey should participate in the SOC program.  With the recent deployment of over 3,600 New Jersey National Guard Troops and the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan the number of New Jersey veterans is growing with each passing day.  We owe it to these brave service men and women to give them every opportunity available to help them succeed when returning from honorably serving our country.  We want to make the SOC program mandatory at every state university in the State of New Jersey.