The basic answer is yes, but you may have some difficulties, depending on your situation.

If you are eligible for the Montgomery GI Bill – Active Duty, you may use your benefits to pay for flight training, as long as the flight school is listed in the VA’s database. You can check this by using the search form on the WEAMS Institution Search page.

If you are using the new Post 9/11 GI Bill, you can currently only use your benefits to cover the courses if the school that provides the flight training is listed in the database as an “institute of higher learning,” meaning that it also confers traditional academic degrees (associate, bachelor, etc.). This is undergoing a change due to an amendment to the GI Bill, and beginning on October 1, 2011, the new GI Bill will cover flight school programs as it does other educational programs, but only up to an annual maximum of $10,000 in tuition and fees.

This is a misunderstanding of the policy that you heard about.

In the fall of 2009, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs was experiencing very serious delays in processing GI Bill applications. Because of this delay, a lot of students waiting for their GI Bill to come through were being forced to pay for their tuition up-front. Because of this, the VA offered a one-time-only advance to pay for up to $3,000 in tuition to students that were experiencing this delay. Repayment of this advance was arranged between the student and the VA.

This offer was only during that particular period, and has not been offered since.

It is possible to take courses from two ore more different institutions at once under the GI Bill. One school will be your primary institution, which will determine whether courses count toward completion of your degree program. Any other courses will be additional to this, and you will transfer the credits to your primary school after you complete them.

The process of doing the paperwork for this situation varies depending on the version of the GI Bill you are using. I recommend that you ask for information from either your school’s veterans’ affairs office, or from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs via their toll-free GI Bill number: 1-888-442-4551.

You are very likely eligible for more educational benefits from the GI Bill, but without knowing more details, it’s hard to tell exactly what.

If you signed up for the Montgomery GI Bill when you first enlisted on active duty, then you should have been eligible for either 36 months of educational benefits, if you served the full term of your initial enlistment, or a number of months equal to the number of months you served on active duty (up to 36 months), if you served less and were discharged due to medical disability.

If you signed up for and have been using the Montgomery GI Bill – Selected Reserves, then you should be eligible for 36 total months of benefits under that program, but you must use these benefits while you are on an active drilling status in the Reserves or National Guard.

You should also be eligible for the new Post 9/11 GI Bill, which requires at least 90 consecutive days of active duty that falls after September 11, 2001. This bill also always provides 36 months of benefits. The more active duty time that you have served, the higher percentage of your tuition it pays, up to 100% at 36 or more months of active duty.

They (whoever they were) were correct. You may only draw on your GI Bill benefits while you are taking college courses. They are not intended to cover existing educational loan debts.

The normally intended method for paying off a school loan is to find employment in a field that uses the education you received, and use the income from that employment to pay off the loan. Most college loans have reasonable terms and a long grace period that makes this practical. Current employment trends are making this difficult for many people, but there is no better method available.

No, the GI Bill may only be used to cover the costs of college courses that you are currently taking. Technically, if you are using the Montgomery GI Bill, you may use the benefit money however you like, but you must be taking sufficient college courses in order to be eligible to receive the money. The GI Bill is not intended to cover existing college loan debt.

You should speak to the financial aid office at a university about this; you are probably not required to completely settle existing college loans before taking additional courses. It may simply be more difficult to get further federally-subsidized college loans.

No, I’m afraid not. If your only term in the military ended with a general discharge, then you are not eligible for any GI Bill benefits, even if you contributed to the Montgomery GI Bill while in. This is true even if the general discharge is characterized as “under honorable conditions.” Only an honorable discharge allows you to keep GI Bill benefits.