Attending college and Unemployment benefits for military service.

by calikid
(kansas)

can i collect unemployment while attending college. I am collecting unemployment from the US Army. That was my last job.


Hi Calikid,

Maybe. It depends on your plans.

You've got it right that you are collecting unemployment from the US Army, but the way it works since it was basically "Federal employment" is that whatever state you apply for benefits in will be the state whose statutes and laws apply when settling any eligibility question. Read more here.

Attending college is an eligibility factor if you want to collect unemployment benefits.

We need to check DOLETA which gives us state by state information about collecting unemployment benefits while attending school. Click the current year, then go to Nonmonetary, Table 5-12

The question that the chart asks is whether a person is disqualified or ineligible while attending school. For Kansas the answer is: Yes, disqualified, including vacation periods, unless full-time work is concurrent with school attendance, or school schedule does not affect availability for work.

No matter what state you are in, you need to check the issue of unemployment and school out before you quit to attend school or decide to attend school while still working.

If you were involved in a work-study program while attending school .. you might be one of those surprised to find out that the employment was not "covered employment" and there are no benefits available for this type of work.


What is true for all states is that if you are attending college and collecting benefits .. you will endanger the benefits the minute you put school ahead of work.

Since you were in the military, there may be some exceptions or other options available to you, which I am not familiar with.