Skip to main content

A GI Bill Success Story

Hi everyone and welcome (or welcome back) to the blog “Soldier to Student”. This blog is going to be dedicated to talking about a GI Bill success story. I was doing a bit of research on famous individuals who used their GI Bill to kick start their success and I found a famous figure who I figured most everyone would know. Clint Eastwood, a very successful actor and director! Born in 1930, Clint Eastwood was drafted in the 1950s during the time of the Korean War. He served his Army contract at Fort Ord in California as a swimming instructor. Clint was honorably discharged in 1953 and shortly after used his GI Bill to attend Los Angeles City College and study drama. This led to him landing his first contract with Universal Studios making $75 a week. His first couple years consisted of him acting in small roles in a string of B-movies. Then in 1959 he was picked up by CBS and cast as cattle driver Rowdy Yates in the long-running series "Rawhide." It was a big enough break that it opened the door for him to get the role that made him an international star. After acting in Sergio Leone's legendary trilogy “A Fistful of Dollars” (1964), “For a Few Dollars More” (1965), and “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” (made in Italy in 1966, released in the U.S. in 1967), Eastwood had made a name for himself. Eastwood went on to act in and direct many award winning movies. The next time you put on a Clint Eastwood movie remember, his pathway to success included using his GI Bill to pursue a degree!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Post 9-11 GI Bill vs. Montgomery GI Bill

Hi everyone and welcome (or welcome back) to the blog “Soldier to Student”. In this post I am going to compare the Post 9-11 GI Bill with the Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB). Both of these are federal education grants offered to qualifying veterans. To qualify for the Post-9/11 GI Bill you must have started your service on or after September 11, 2001, and one of these must be true: you served for at least 90 days total on active duty, you served for at least 30 days on active duty (without a break) and were honorably discharged with a service-connected disability, or you received a Purple Heart. To qualify for the MGIB, the required service start date depends on certain factors, like when you served on active duty and whether your military pay decreased. Y ou must have served between 2 and 4 years. The minimum amount of time you must have served depends on other factors. Both benefits provide 36 months of coverage but note, in certain situations, you may be eligible for more than 1 educa...
Post a Comment
Read more

Four Grants that Could Apply to You

Hi everyone and welcome to the blog ‘Soldier to Student”. This blog is going to cover the four educational grants you may or may not be eligible for. Since these grants are very complex, this post will be more of a broad overview with future posts going more into depth on individual grants. These grants include the Post 9-11 GI Bill, the Montgomery GI Bill, the Illinois Veterans Grant, and the Illinois National Guard Grant. The Post 9-11 GI Bill (PGIB or Chapter 33): This is a federal grant given to those who have served on active duty or in the Selected Reserve for 90 or more days after Sep. 10, 2001. The payment rate depends on how much active-duty time or federal service a member has. What it can pay may include… Tuition and fees Money for housing  Money for books and supplies Money to help you move from a rural area to go to school      Below I am going to link the official page for the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs  which will include a more in-depth...
Post a Comment
Read more

What If the Illinois Veterans Grant Went Away?

Hi everyone and welcome (or welcome back) to the blog “Soldier to Student”. In this post I want to talk about what would happen if the Illinois Veterans Grant went away. Now I just want to preface this by saying this is all hypothetical and I am only bringing this up because it would be interesting to analyze the impacts it would have. Unfortunately I was unable to find the number of veterans using this grant, which I was going to use to illustrate the number of veterans who would be affected, but regardless of how many it affects I am going to talk about what we would see. First of all, veterans would receive no state funding. The Illinois Veterans Grant pays tuition and mandatory fees at all Illinois state-supported colleges, universities and community colleges for veterans who served a minimum of two years and enlisted from and returned to Illinois. I personally use this grant and losing this money would mean solely relying on federal funding for school. Right now since I am using t...
Post a Comment
Read more