Podcast: VET TEC is back in 2025! What's new for veterans and coding bootcamps

Table of Contents

• What is VET TEC?
• What VET TEC will look like in 2025...
• How to Apply for VET TEC in 2025

Thanks to the Dole Act, VET TEC funding is back in 2025!  Alicia Boddy, the founder of the VET TEC Working Group and a tremendous advocate for veterans pursuing careers in tech, breaks down what VET TEC 2.0 will look like for veterans and training providers. Find out who will be eligible for VET TEC, when to apply for VET TEC funding this year, and how VET TEC will affect your GI Bill benefit. Plus, Alicia shares her insights for past VET TEC providers and new training providers who want to help military veterans launch new tech careers this year. 

What is VET TEC?

Liz: On December 16th, 2024, the House sent the Dole Act to be signed by the President. That means that it was passed by the House, passed by the Senate, then voted and passed again by the House, and is now sitting on President Biden's desk. The Dole Act is bipartisan. It does a lot to improve veteran healthcare and benefits! But what we are interested in today is that it includes the reauthorization of VET TEC. Alicia, can you explain what VET TEC is and why it's been such a game changer for veterans in the past?

Alicia: VET TEC is an innovative VA education benefit that allows veterans to train in accelerated training programs like coding bootcamps. It ensures that those bootcamps lead to high technology careers, so there's a big emphasis on getting a job after the training happens. Specifically, VET TEC works with these accelerated training providers that are between 6-28 weeks in length.

It allows for this training to be done remotely, which is a little bit unique in the VA education space. Veterans are often able to use VET TEC for training that is not GI Bill-approved. VET TEC specifically works with these training providers that prioritize what the VA calls meaningful employment, and that employment happens within six months of graduation. The VA does this by paying providers installments, so 50 % of the tuition is paid to training providers once a veteran secures that meaningful employment.

Liz: Thank you for mentioning meaningful employment. I think that's one of the things that makes VET TEC such an innovative approach and a program that could be used as a model maybe even like outside of the VA when we think about career education. It's a reason that I've kept a close eye on VET TEC over the years. How many veterans used VET TEC during the pilot?

Alicia: The pilot ran from April 2019 through November 2023, and over 14,000 veterans received training during that time! It was a great five-year opportunity. The program exhausted its final round of funding on November 17th, 2023, and it's been offline since then as we've worked through the legislative process to get it reauthorized and moved out of a pilot phase into a closer version of a permanent program.

Liz: So it's been a solid year since anyone has actually been able to use VET TEC. It may have taken a minute for VET TEC to gain steam, but once it did, people loved VET TEC. I feel like veterans really loved it and actually used it, and bootcamps really liked being a part of it. Everyone was disappointed when VET TEC ran out of funding and when the pilot eventually ended, students were disappointed.

Alicia: It was a huge opportunity for veterans to access this training, especially remotely. VET TEC hit its stride right as the pandemic was ramping up and schools were moving to remote training. Because of the working group, training providers were able to work directly with the VA and get the procedural kinks worked out really quickly. There was really very limited interruption in training for veterans as compared to other VA education benefits. We were able to get this reauthorization of VET TEC because of the success of the pilot. So a big thank you to all the veterans that participated and the training providers that were part of the pilot and offered their services up. At the height of the VET TEC pilot in 2021, around 30 programs that were approved. We intentionally kept it small. The VA really took a lot of pride in selecting training providers that not only had this cutting edge curriculum, but also prioritize that meaningful employment.

What VET TEC will look like in 2025...

Liz: What will be different about VET TEC in 2025?

Alicia: The reauthorization VET TEC 2.0 has been reauthorized for two years as part of the Dole Act. It will allow for 4,000 training spots per year. During the pilot, we had a $45 million budget, but with the relaunched VET TEC, we will be counting spots and that will be 4,000 individuals per fiscal year (the fiscal year starts on October 1st). There's also been a decent amount of changes to the eligibility for both veterans and training providers. Once this law is signed, the VA will start digging into those legislative changes, and then we'll start building a process to make sure that veterans can be approved and training providers can be approved. Overall, it's the same idea with training between 6-28 weeks. 

Liz: Would VET TEC consume some of a veteran's GI bill eligibility this time around?

Alicia: During the pilot, veterans just needed GI Bill, like chapter 33 of eligibility remaining to be eligible for VET TEC. They could have one day remaining and receive full VET TEC benefit. Now in VET TEC 2.0, the VA will consume some of your GI Bill. One of the things they're trying to figure out is how much. 

Liz: Assuming the President signs this, when could a student could attend a boot camp on VET TEC this year? 

Alicia: Once the bill is signed, it is law and it is technically live. The VA will need about four to six months to dive through the legislation and stand up these new processes, both to approve veterans and to approve training providers. All training providers from the VET TEC pilot will have to be reapproved. Unfortunately, no one is grandfathered in from the pilot. I hope in that next four to six months we can start to approve veterans and training providers. Knowing that we only have two years, it will be really important to get both of those groups training and into jobs so that we can go back to Congress and get the program reapproved for more years.

How to Apply for VET TEC in 2025

Liz: If I'm a veteran, what should I be doing to prepare right now? How can I make sure that I get one of those 4,000 VET TEC spots in 2025?

Alicia: For all the veterans listening, I highly recommend that you sign up for updates via email from VA Education. Make sure that your account with the VA Education office is up to date, and that you have secured your GI Bill eligibility. Sometimes you have to do a little paperwork to make sure that your post-9-11 is available. Make sure that all of your paperwork is in order so that when the new approval process is rolled out, you can apply and get that certificate of eligibility as soon as possible — That will be your ticket to go to an approved training provider and connect the dots between VET TEC and that training provider!

Liz: For providers who may have participated in the pilot phase, what should they know? 

Alicia: Don't throw anything away from your pilot training days! Hopefully you've kept all your records from the VET TEC pilot program. I would anticipate the approval process looking very similar. If you were part of the pilot, you've probably done 80% of the work. The forms will likely look a little different. We may ask for some different information as the VA is trying to approve new programs, but I would anticipate most of the information being the same. If you're waiting and want to do something with that nervous energy, go ahead and get those forms updated. That will be a great way to kind of get ahead of the curve once the approval process is released. On my VET TEC Working Group on LinkedIn, I personally share updates, so follow there for more information on these new approvals for both veterans and providers. 

Liz: For training providers who were not part of the VET TEC pilot, what should they consider when applying to be an approved provider for the first time?

Alicia: Don't hesitate to apply! VET TEC is an incredible program and a really great way to get more veterans into your training. Make sure that your curriculum is aligned to finding meaningful employment within six months. That is a huge priority for this program. We need veterans training and getting jobs quickly so that they're seeing success as quickly as they want to.

From an operational standpoint, make sure that your school is set up to receive tuition payment in installments. Like the pilot, providers will be paid 25% at enrollment, 25% at graduation, and then another 50% once that meaningful employment is secured. Depending on the length of the program and the length of job finding, it can take months to receive those payments from the VA. Make sure that your school is set up to not only track those payments, but manage that cashflow so that you can focus on training the veterans. I'm always available as a resource to help schools set up processes that will set them up for success!

Liz: Is that payment scheme only for preferred bootcamp partners as part of VET TEC?

Alicia: It'll be for everyone. Preferred providers during the pilot program signed a form that said if someone didn't receive meaningful employment within six months, they would actually refund 100% of the tuition. VET TEC 2.0 has not eliminated that provision, but it's not a way to get preferred status anymore. Preferred status will be based on outcomes, which should help veterans pick a school that's good for them. There won't be as much refunding of 100% tuition. That was one of the things we learned during the pilot that sounded really good from a policy standpoint, but it became very problematic for a lot of training providers. With VET TEC 2.0, there shouldn't be as much refunding, but everyone will get paid in those installments.

Liz: Is there anything else that's on the horizon or that you're hearing whispers of that could be interesting to keep an eye out for in the upcoming year?

Alicia: I would put a plug in for Chapter 33, Veteran Readiness and Employment, formerly known as VOC Rehab. It's a really incredible benefit that many veterans could take advantage of, so I highly recommend anyone interested, especially if you've exhausted your GI Bill benefits, take a look at Chapter 33. There is an approval process for it, but you could use that benefit at many of these same training providers.