University of Florida taking the lead for wounded veterans

Galloway: Returning veterans are changing college campuses
By JOSEPH GALLOWAY

last updated: February 09, 2008 07:31:23 AM


GAINESVILLE, Fla. — There's a fast-growing new community on the campuses of our universities and colleges — young men and women combat veterans fresh out of military service. Those here at the University of Florida and Santa Fe Community College have change on their agenda.

With the help of a local congressman, supporters in the community and a soft-spoken campus veterans' adviser, they just might succeed in fixing some problems and meeting a need that no one imagined we'd face.

The biggest and most expensive dream of these new GI Bill scholars is to build a special 90-apartment complex to accommodate the physical and educational needs of young military veterans who've come home severely wounded from Iraq and Afghanistan. SFCC President Dr.

Jackson Sasser was an early and enthusiastic supporter of the assisted living facility for wounded veterans, and Dr. James Bernard Machen, the president of the University of Florida, supports the effort, too.

These veterans — some missing limbs, others paralyzed — require levels of assistance and care that virtually lock them out of higher education. Some are even sent to live in nursing homes filled with those whose lives are ending, not just beginning.

John Gebhardt works with the 900 to 1,000 new GI Bill veterans who're attending the university and the college each semester. He and they are passionate about wanting to provide a better opportunity for severely wounded young veterans to gain an education.

"The facility we hope to see built here would be totally handicap-accessible," Gebhardt told me this week. "With both hired staff and volunteers, the wounded veterans would be provided transportation to classes on the two campuses, as well as rides to the regional Veterans Administration center for ongoing medical care." The complex also would have facilities for physical therapy and rehabilitation and, when these veterans have to return to a VA hospital for treatment of old or new complications from their wounds, other volunteer veterans would help them keep up with their studies so they don't lose entire semesters. "We are talking about young people who have sacrificed so much in service to our country," Gebhardt said.

"They need an education; they need to be with people their own age; they need to begin easing back into society and finding a future for themselves." Such a facility would cost an estimated $30 million for the purchase of the land and construction. U.S. Rep. Cliff Stearns, a local Republican, is an enthusiastic supporter of the idea and is going to bat for the money in Washington.
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