4 Ways DANTES takes the Frustration out of Military Education

Each year, DANTES partners with the military Services, education providers, and academic institutions to deliver programs that help Service members like you achieve their education goals.

For more than 40 years, this partnership has enabled the voluntary education community to provide military students with programs that ensure college readiness, facilitate academic success, and support transition. Throughout FY16, DANTES continued its commitment to integrity, innovation and supporting Service members by conducting pilot projects and introducing new initiatives to improve student access to programs. Here's a snapshot of FY16 program highlights:

Exams: Improving Preparation & Access

• Credit by Examinations continues to remain one of the most popular DANTES-sponsored programs. To help Service members better prepare for CLEP exams, DANTES partnered with College Board to offer free CLEP eGuides to Service members. Now, every Service member has instant access to CLEP study guides when they register to take an exam. See https://clep.collegeboard.org/earn-college-credit/military-benefits
• During the spring, DANTES partnered with Prometric to offer a "second chance" for Service members to obtain college credit when taking and passing DSST exams. For those who did not receive a passing score on their first attempt, they received an email with a voucher code for a FREE retake of the exam. By temporarily eliminating student costs, this initiative increased DSST testing volumes by nearly 20 percent. Visit http://getcollegecredit.com/test_takers for more information.
• The Examinations program staff worked with testing agencies to stand up International Test Centers worldwide. This effort increased Service members’ access to academic exams in remote locations by adding more than 700 test centers where members can take exams around the world. Find a test center near you: http://getcollegecredit.com/institutions/search
• DANTES automated the exam reimbursement process, making it easier and faster for members to apply online and receive repayment for select exams. While Service members can still take paper-based ACT and SAT exams at DANTES test sites, they are now eligible to be reimbursed for ACT, SAT, GRE, GMAT, GED and PRAXIS exams at national test centers. For details, go to our reimbursement page.

Supporting the VolEd Community

• The DANTES Education Services Advisory Group (DESAG) was reestablished to continually promote communication with the voluntary education community. This group represents all Services and offers their specific perspective of voluntary education services and programs to DANTES; in turn, they pass information about these programs on to their education service teams supporting military members.
• The DESAG reviewed and streamlined educational publications offered through DANTES. As a result, DANTES implemented an improved online ordering process and distributed 322K items to 400+ education support locations worldwide.
• To improve outreach to the voluntary education community, DANTES established its Communications Division. Tasked with leading synchronized publicity and outreach campaigns about DANTES-sponsored programs, the new Division redesigned the format and increased monthly viewers of the DANTES newsletter (DIB), doubled Facebook followers and engagement, executed outreach campaigns for strategic priorities, and increased monthly website traffic more than 20 percent. If you have questions, contact us at dantes_outreach@navy.mil
• Throughout the year, a top-to-bottom review of the Troops to Teachers program resulted in a roadmap for future success for transitioning Service members and veterans. This year, the program increased the number of new teacher job placements by 24 percent. Check out the newly updated TTT website at www.proudtoserveagain.com

If you are looking for quick, up-to-date program information, you can find it on DANTES Social Media:

• FB: DANTES.DoD
• Twitter: @DANTES_DoD
• LinkedIn: DANTES-Defense Activity for Non-Traditional Education Support

• FB: Troops to Teachers: TTT.DANTES
• Twitter: @TTT_DANTES
• LinkedIn: Troops to Teachers – DANTES/DoD