On Thursday, October 20, 2022, twenty (20) representatives from eight (8) area Kansas colleges and four (4) veteran service agencies convened on the ICC West Campus for a day of practical learning, sharing and collaborating about how to serve more veteran students in the future with greater effectiveness. This first-ever gathering of collegiate staff who deal directly with veteran students was hosted by the Veteran Student Success Center at ICC and made possible by the U. S. Department of Education/FIPSE. The 2022 Southeast Kansas Veteran Student Services Providers Symposium was designed to encourage all twelve (12) SEK post-secondary institutions to come together to share their successes and to seek solutions to common concerns and issues regarding veterans and other military-affiliated students.
Speakers and presenters from Southeast KANSASWORKS (Melissa Johnson, Kai Rannells and Victor Follis) joined Chris Mitchell (HSH Homeless Ministry), Loran Osborne (Four County Mental Health) and Taylor Crawshaw (Independence Community College) to generously offer their wide-range of pertinent expertise to the symposium guests. Additionally, veteran students, Leah Delamarter (U. S. Navy) and Maurice Henderson (U. S. Army), gave their personal and inspirational stories about accessing veteran student benefits to advance their education and career goals.
This 2022 Symposium was planned and executed to be the “inaugural” event of what is expected to be an annual affair with each future gathering to be held on a different SE Kansas campus. Schools represented at this initial collaboration were Allen Community College, Butler Community College, Cowley College, Flint Hills Technical College, Fort Scott Community College, Pittsburg State University, Southwestern College and Independence Community College.
According to Tommy Ellis, Director of the Veteran Student Support Center at ICC, “The importance of an event like this Symposium cannot be overstated. Only by collaborating with all veteran student service providers at all post-secondary education institutions in Southeast Kansas will the entire veteran population of this area be justly and honorably served. They’ve earned it. They deserve it. Now it’s up to the SE Kansas schools to deliver.”
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