The Veterans Administration provides headstones and markers for eligible children of veterans.
The Department of Veterans Administration operates four major programs that provide financial and medical assistance to veterans' dependent children as well as the surviving children of deceased veterans. These benefits typically are available to unmarried children up to age 19 if they are full-time high school students, and disabled dependent children of any age who were disabled before age 22. Benefits also may be paid to stepchildren, grandchildren, or adopted children under certain conditions. Eligibility for most benefits is based on the veteran's discharge from active military service under other than dishonorable conditions.
Survivors' and Dependents' Educational Assistance Program (DEA)
The Survivors' and Dependents' Educational Assistance Program (DEA) subsidizes up to 45 months of training and educational opportunities to eligible veteran dependent children between the ages of 18 and 26. Eligible recipients must be the dependent child of a veteran who died during active duty or as a result of a service-connected disability, is totally and permanently disabled as the result of a service-connected disability, or missing in action or captured in the line of duty by enemy forces. The DEA may be used to enroll in approved degree or certificate programs, as well as apprenticeships or on-the-job training programs.
Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC)
The last military command of a service member provides a $100,000 death gratuity payment to the next of kin of those who die while on active duty or within 120 days of separation as a result of service-connected injury or illness. Veterans' dependent children may also be eligible for Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) if death resulted from an injury or disease incurred in the line of duty or a service-connected disability. Dependents of veterans who were totally disabled from service-connected conditions at the time of death may also qualify for DIC. Payments will be adjusted to reflect any amounts awarded from judicial proceedings resulting from the veteran's death.
Death Pension
Unmarried low-income disabled dependent children of deceased veterans may be entitled to monthly death pension benefit payments if a deceased veteran served over 90 days of active duty military service, at least one day of which was during a period of wartime. The veteran must have received a discharge other than dishonorable for dependents to be eligible for a death pension. The dependent child must be under the age of 18, permanently unable to support themselves due to disability occurring before the age of 18, or under the age of 23 if attending a VA-approved educational institution.
VA Civilian Health and Medical Program (CHAMPVA)
CHAMPVA is a health care program in which the Veterans Administration shares the cost of covered medically and psychologically necessary services with eligible dependent children. To be considered eligible, the sponsoring veteran must be totally and permanently disabled due to a service-connected condition, have died as a result of a service-connected condition, or died on active duty. The dependent must not be entitled to standard Department of Defense Tricare benefits.
Tags: dependent children, active duty, result service-connected, service-connected disability, Veterans Administration, Assistance Program
