Lidell Booysen is a U.S. Navy veteran and a mechanical engineering student at the University of Rhode Island. The 25-year-old isn’t like most of his classmates, many of whom are at least several years younger.
Booysen spent his early-adult years aboard the nuclear attack sub USS North Carolina, manning the sonar station. And while most undergraduates return to their dorms on the campus in South Kingstown after class, Booysen commutes to the Providence home he shares with his girlfriend.
It takes a special kind of college to bridge that gap for veteran and active-duty students, he says. But for such a small state, Rhode Island has these schools in abundance. Five of the Ocean State’s 13 colleges and universities earned a Military Friendly School distinction for the 2025-2026 school year.
To receive such a ranking, participating colleges had to submit a lengthy questionnaire to Viqtory, a veteran-owned recruitment marketing and advertising agency that awards the designations based on a series of metrics.
Those metrics include how well they support military and veteran students – focusing on graduation and retention rates, job placement, financial aid and access to dedicated services. Schools must also meet federal standards, such as participation in the G.I. Bill, Yellow Ribbon Program and U.S. Department of Defense Tuition Assistance. Evaluations are conducted using public data and overall performance.
And Booysen has a unique perspective on what designated schools are doing right. Before transferring to URI, which was ranked the 10th-best Military Friendly School in the country among Tier 2 research institutions for the second year in a row, Booysen says he started his college career at the University of Hawaii immediately after leaving the Navy.
“I saw how the veteran student population at UH wasn’t robust at all,” he said. “It was barely existent; I thought this was just how it was at college until I came here. URI is leaps and bounds better than UH was for military and veteran student support.”
Because of that support, he’s now on track to graduate with a degree in engineering in the spring of 2027.
“URI knows what it’s doing,” Booysen said. “This is what other schools across the country should be striving towards.”
Robert Flynn, director of URI’s Center for Military and Veteran Education, oversees the school’s veteran and active-duty student body.
The MAVE center was established in September 2022 and within two years, URI received its first of two top-10 designations. Flynn says the center and the university quickly focused on getting military and veteran students college credits for skills and courses they took during their military service.
“I had a bunch of credits apply,” Booysen said. “In fact, I didn’t even have to take any general education courses because of my transferable Navy credits. I didn’t have to waste any time enrolling in classes I didn’t want to take. That gave me a whole lot of space to explore what I am interested in.”
URI and the MAVE center also made sure to offer mental health counseling and academic advising, and the university created an enrollment position specifically for veterans and active-duty personnel. The school even made sure there was enough parking for veterans, who like Booysen, often do not live on campus.
This year, URI also received its first Military Spouse Friendly School designation to further support and attract the veteran student body.
“If you support the veteran’s family, you support the veteran,” Flynn said. “These are the types of things that veteran and active-duty students are looking for in a school. The designation is a way to advertise to these potential students that we can and do provide that.”
Elsewhere in the state, Providence College earned a silver ranking among private colleges; the Community College of Rhode Island received gold in the large community college category; and Salve Regina University earned bronze among private institutions that offer doctoral degrees. Another school, Bristol Community College in nearby Fall River, received silver in the small community college category.
Rhode Island College also received a silver designation this year in the small public school category. RIC currently has about 300 veteran students, says Micaela Black, one of the school’s Military Resource Center student veteran coordinators.
“It’s a very important distinction,” Black said. “It’s our way to advertise to veteran and active-duty servicemembers who are looking for military-friendly schools. That gives them confidence in enrolling into our academic programs, but they really feel the support when they actually get here.”
Many veterans use the Military Friendly School designation as a tool to identify schools that offer solid support services and help with career preparation, according to Viqtory.
“Going to a Military Friendly designated school is the perfect segue for veterans. It eases all the harsh transitions; going from military service, to getting a degree, finding internships, to eventually landing a job,” Booysen said.
