Readers of Tom Philpott's Military Update column sound off.

Some Colleges Ready to Make 'Yellow Ribbon' Deals

In response to your article on private colleges and the Post-9/11 GI Bill's Yellow Ribbon initiative, you can count us in, as soon as the VA provides enough detail, to make an informed commitment.

We are an independent, non-profit college in Lower Manhattan serving the New York City metro area with a focused set of career-oriented programs at the bachelor's and master's level. We hope and intend to make our bachelor's degree programs free to qualified veterans under the Yellow Ribbon initiative. We are just waiting for the details to fall into place.

I am sure that there are many independent colleges and universities as eager as we are to join the program and begin serving veterans when the program kicks off for the coming fall term. To use Mr. Keith Wilson's words, we are ready to give a “strong, iron clad, by-God-we're-going-to-do-this” commitment as soon as the pieces are in place.

VINTON THOMPSON
President
Metropolitan College of New York
New York, N.Y.

I want to give you some positive news on new GI Bill Yellow Ribbon front. The Breen School of Nursing at Ursuline College in Pepper Pike, Ohio is not letting the financial crisis hinder our dedication to recruiting ten veterans for the 2009-2010 academic year.

As a leading educator in healthcare, Ursuline College's Breen School of Nursing has maintained a stellar reputation within the health care community for over 30 years. Our nursing graduates have a 100 percent employment rate. It's the best place to become not only what you want to be but who you want to be. Ursuline offers traditional BSN, LPN to BSN, RN to BSN, accelerated BSN and MSN degrees.

We hope you can help us get the word out that we are making this opportunity available to veterans.

REBECCA BOFINGER
MSN, RN
Assistant Professor, BSN Recruitment
The Breen School of Nursing
Pepper Pike, Ohio

Your article states that the Yellow Ribbon applies to private colleges and universities. I was led to believe by VA that it could also apply to graduate degrees at public universities as that tuition would be higher than the undergraduate tuition.

Can you explain if you are misinterpreting the meaning of the Yellow Ribbon or if VA has given out incorrect information?

JOSEPH W. GROSS
Major
New Embassy Complex, Annex 2
Baghdad, Iraq

You are correct that the Yellow Ribbon program will apply to more than private schools including public school graduate studies and the higher tuition charged out-of-state students attending state-run schools. – Tom Philpott.

PHARMACY REFILLS GO OFFLINE

Military hospitals have been offering online pharmacy refills in addition to telephone refills. In addition, they have offered an online formulary for civilian physicians to verify if a drug is available at the local military treatment facility.

Last week the Naval Hospital, Bremerton, Wash., removed both from its web page. They now only offer telephone service. A complaint to the hospital customer support returned a reply that the removal was directed by Navy Bureau of Medicine.

I realize this is not a major item in the broad picture, but it seems a step backward. After trying for two days, I realized there is no way to register a complaint at the BUMED level. I was repeatedly redirected to the local hospital.

To this retiree, this seems like a major step backward.

DAVE THOMPSON
Captain, U.S. Army-Ret.
Bremerton, Wash.

PATERNITY LEAVE NEAR

I told my husband, who is assigned to U.S. Army South, about the new paternity leave benefit that Congress approved for military fathers last year.

My husband's unit told him it doesn't recognize any paternity leave so he will have to use annual leave to spend time with the baby and me.

He only has 10 days' annual leave remaining and wanted to use them when we see family. I am due in 22 days and don't know what's correct on this. Do you have any answers?

HILDIE DIETRICH
Fort Sam Houston
San Antonio, Texas

Your husband will get his paternity leave but perhaps not in time so he can use it immediately after the birth of your child. The conflicting signal he's gotten from his unit results from an absence of implementing instructions on the new leave entitlement. It is still in final coordination at the Pentagon.

The law states that new military fathers are eligible for 10 days of paternity leave for births on or after Oct. 14, 2008. The services must offer the leave retroactively, for births since that date, once implementing instructions take effect.

Defense officials will reissue DoD Instruction 1327.6 with a new provision on paternity leave. The services then will develop their own implementation guidance and notify their units. Both the draft policy and the law give units discretion to determine when the leave is granted. This ensures that it doesn't affect mission readiness, deployments or other command priorities. – T.P.

Military retirees at Kunsan Air Base in Korea cannot get appointments on base for chronic care. No contract TRICARE provider is available in the area so we must pay 100 percent of costs and then wait more than six weeks for TRICARE reimbursement.

The base pharmacy will not honor prescriptions from off-base doctors and Korean pharmacies area "off limits" under base community standards.

The only recourse for military retirees at Kunsan is to travel three hours each way to Osan Air Base to get chronic care and prescriptions filled. This is unacceptable. The Kunsan Air Base clinic should be rated an F.

Am I upset? You bet!

WILLIAM E. SHARPE
Master Sergeant, USAF-Ret.
Kunsan Air Base, Korea

Letters may be edited for clarity or length. Write to Military Forum, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA 20120-1111, send e-mail to militaryforum@aol.com or visit www.militaryupdate.com.