Student veterans’ transition and reintegration into education: a transnational scoping review

Abstract

ABSTRACT This scoping review focuses on student veterans’ transition and reintegration into education and presents key themes in international student veteran research. Grounded in a literature search in ERIC, Scopus, and Web of Science, our scoping review includes 137 articles across research disciplines. It covers publications from the last 15 years, with a transnational focus. Analysis of these articles resulted in two key themes: (1) Transition challenges of student veterans, including differences in military and academic learning, mental health challenges in class and on campus, and social interaction with non-veteran students and faculty. (2) Support efforts for student veterans, including becoming a veteran-friendly campus, academic support, mental health support, and social support. In addition to discussing these key themes across articles, we map prevalent conceptual frameworks, and discuss commonly used definitions of student veterans, veteran demographics, as well as descriptions of military education culture and academic education culture that we found in the literature. The subsequent discussion highlights that the academic success of student veterans often focuses on metrics, which highlights the qualification function of education, while disregarding the socialisation of veterans in education and their development of relative autonomy.