Fry Scholarship Eligibility: Who Qualifies for This GI Bill Survivor Benefit
6 min read · Last updated August 23, 2026
- Covers children and surviving spouses of a service member or Selected Reserve member who died on or after September 11, 2001, from a line-of-duty or service-connected cause.
- Pays up to 36 months of Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits, including tuition, a housing allowance, and a books stipend.
- Surviving spouses keep eligibility after remarriage, and benefits that expired can be restored for use starting January 2, 2025.
- Spouses must choose between the Fry Scholarship and Chapter 35 Dependents’ Educational Assistance (DEA) permanently. There’s no switching later.
In this article
- What the Fry Scholarship is
- Who qualifies
- What it covers
- How to apply
- What causes denials or delays
- Frequently asked questions
Gunnery Sergeant Miguel Torres died from wounds he sustained in Helmand Province in 2011. Eleven years later, his daughter found out she had until age 33, not 26, to claim up to 36 months of Fry Scholarship benefits toward her nursing degree at a state university. She’d nearly let the deadline pass because she assumed the program worked like a standard dependent benefit with an age-26 cutoff. It doesn’t, and getting the eligibility window wrong is the single most common way families leave this benefit on the table.
What the Fry Scholarship is
The Fry Scholarship is named for Marine Gunnery Sergeant John David Fry, who was killed in Iraq in 2006. It extends Post-9/11 GI Bill education benefits to the surviving spouses and children of service members and Selected Reserve members who died in the line of duty or from a service-connected disability on or after September 11, 2001. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) administers it as part of Chapter 33, the same chapter that governs the standard Post-9/11 GI Bill.
It is a separate program from Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC), the monthly VA payment made to survivors of a service member who died from a service-connected cause. Some survivors qualify for both programs at once, and how the two interact depends on whether the applicant is a child or a spouse.
Who qualifies
Eligibility runs through the service member’s death, not the survivor’s own service record. A child or surviving spouse qualifies if the service member died from one of these causes on or after September 11, 2001:
- Died in the line of duty while on active duty
- Died from a service-connected disability within 120 days of discharge or release from active duty
- Was a Selected Reserve member who died in the line of duty, other than while on active duty
- Was a Selected Reserve member who died from a service-connected disability
Children can be married or unmarried and must be at least 18 years old or have finished high school or earned a General Educational Development (GED) credential before using the benefit. The age window then depends on when the parent died. If the parent died before January 1, 2013, the child is generally eligible until turning 33. If the parent died on or after January 1, 2013, or was a Selected Reserve member, there is no age cutoff at all.
Surviving spouses keep their eligibility if they remarry, as long as they originally qualified through the marriage to the deceased service member. If a spouse’s Fry Scholarship benefits had expired unused, the VA will restore them for use any time after January 2, 2025, even for a spouse who has since remarried.
What it covers
The Fry Scholarship pays up to 36 months of Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits. For the 2026-2027 academic year, tuition and fees at private or foreign schools are covered up to $30,908.34, while public in-state tuition and fees are generally covered in full. Recipients also get a Monthly Housing Allowance based on the Basic Allowance for Housing paid to an E-5 with dependents at the school’s zip code, a books and supplies stipend, tutorial assistance, exam and licensing fee reimbursement, and access to the Yellow Ribbon Program at participating schools for costs above the private-school cap. Students taking classes entirely online draw a flat housing allowance instead of the zip-code-based rate, and students at foreign schools draw a separate flat rate.
Families sometimes weigh the Fry Scholarship against Chapter 35 DEA, an older survivor benefit with a flat monthly stipend instead of paid tuition. A spouse can use only one of the two.
| Factor | Fry Scholarship (Chapter 33) | Chapter 35 DEA |
|---|---|---|
| Benefit structure | Tuition and fees paid to school, plus housing allowance and books stipend | Flat monthly stipend paid to the student |
| Full-time monthly rate | Varies by school cost and zip-code housing allowance | $1,574 per month (Oct. 1, 2025 to Sept. 30, 2026) |
| Months of entitlement | Up to 36 months | Up to 36 months for training starting on or after Aug. 1, 2018 |
| Choice for spouses | Permanent election; can’t switch to DEA later | Permanent election; can’t switch to Fry later |
How to apply
Applicants file VA Form 22-5490, the Dependents’ Application for VA Education Benefits, either online through VA.gov or by mail to the regional processing office in the state where the applicant lives, or where the school is located once one is chosen. The service member’s branch acts as the agency of record and must verify the line-of-duty or service-connected death before the VA can approve the claim, so applicants without a Certificate of Eligibility already on file should expect that verification step to take the longest part of the process. Once the VA issues a Certificate of Eligibility, the school’s certifying official reports enrollment each term so payments continue on schedule.
What causes denials or delays
The most frequent hold-up is the agency-of-record verification itself, especially for a service-connected death that falls close to the 120-day discharge window rather than a death that occurred clearly while on active duty. Missing or incomplete service records at that stage stall the whole claim.
The second common mistake is a spouse who has already drawn Chapter 35 Dependents’ Educational Assistance benefits and later tries to also claim the Fry Scholarship, not realizing the choice between the two programs is permanent. There is no reversing that election once benefits have been used.
Children also run into trouble when they keep drawing Dependency and Indemnity Compensation payments after starting to use the Fry Scholarship. The VA requires children to give up DIC while using this benefit, and continuing to collect both can trigger an overpayment that has to be repaid.
Finally, some spouses assume that remarrying or letting benefits lapse permanently closed the door. For eligibility that existed through a prior qualifying marriage, that is no longer automatically true. Benefits that expired unused can be restored for use starting January 2, 2025, regardless of remarriage, so it is worth reapplying with an updated VA Form 22-5490 rather than assuming the door is shut.
For dependents weighing whether to transfer entitlement from a living service member instead, see how GI Bill Transfer of Entitlement works for comparison.
Frequently asked questions
Does the Fry Scholarship end if a surviving spouse remarries? No. A surviving spouse who qualified for the Fry Scholarship through marriage to the deceased service member keeps that eligibility after remarrying. Benefits that previously expired unused can also be restored for use starting January 2, 2025, even for a spouse who has since remarried.
How many months of benefits does the Fry Scholarship provide? The Fry Scholarship provides up to 36 months of Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits, covering tuition and fees, a monthly housing allowance, and a books and supplies stipend, subject to the program’s tuition caps for private and foreign schools.
Can a child use Dependency and Indemnity Compensation and the Fry Scholarship at the same time? No. A child receiving Dependency and Indemnity Compensation must give up those payments to begin using the Fry Scholarship. Surviving spouses are treated differently and can continue receiving Dependency and Indemnity Compensation while using the scholarship.
What’s the difference between the Fry Scholarship and Chapter 35 DEA? The Fry Scholarship pays tuition directly to the school plus a housing allowance, up to 36 months. Chapter 35 Dependents’ Educational Assistance pays a flat monthly stipend, currently $1,574 for full-time enrollment. A spouse must choose one program permanently.
What form do I need to apply for the Fry Scholarship? Applicants file VA Form 22-5490, the Dependents’ Application for VA Education Benefits, online at VA.gov or by mail to the applicable regional processing office. The service member’s branch must first verify the line-of-duty or service-connected death.
