2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Many companies and faculty recognize the student veteran’s skills, experiences, and unique gifts they bring to an organization. However, the existing biases and perceptions by faculty and students to include the veterans themselves can affect the interaction with veterans within the classroom, and eventually how prepared they are to enter the civil workforce (learning outcomes). As presented in recent papers, the generalized perceptions can be either positive or negative without a desire to do so with intent. Informing faculty of these possible perceptions is critical based on the high numbers of current and future student veterans due to the Post 9/11 GI Bill and the veterans’ desire to pursue their educational goals once they leave the military. Veterans are a special demographic who are tracked on federal and state employment Equal Opportunity Hiring Policies and are a special interest group in the US government census. This results in a desire to increase the student veterans a well as active duty military members’ presence in our classrooms, both virtual and physical spaces. Therefore it is important that faculty (subset that of a larger set of key people: advisers, staff, and administrators) who impact the success of veterans within our campuses are cognizant and aware of this group and the diverse opportunities they bring to higher education.

This paper is part of a larger study of perceptions and the impact of those perceptions on our student veterans. Previous and continuing work investigates through a quantitative survey instrument across many academic institutions the staff and faculty perceptions toward student veterans. The survey questions compare the agreement or disagreement of several known veteran stereotypes. The focus of the paper will be on the biases of non-veteran faculty and staff populations based on the faculty and staff role and level within an institution. These mis/perceptions reveal opportunities for staff and faculty training and refinement of institutional policies.