Expanding VAWORKS: Launching the Hazelwood Workflow to Better Serve Texas Veterans

At VAWORKS, our mission has always been clear: make it easier for institutions to serve veterans and their families. Today, we’re proud to share a major milestone in that mission — the successful launch of the Hazelwood workflow within the VAWORKS platform.

This enhancement represents more than just a new feature. It’s a direct response to the real-world complexities schools face when combining federal VA education benefits with the Texas Hazelwood Act. And it was made possible through close collaboration with professionals working on the front lines of veteran education.

Understanding the Challenge

For Texas institutions, supporting student veterans often means navigating two very different benefit programs:

• Federal VA Education Benefits

• Texas Hazelwood Act Benefits

Each program has its own rules, documentation requirements, eligibility details, and processing timelines. For School Certifying Officials (SCOs) and Veterans Officers, managing both simultaneously can be complex, time-consuming, and often requires manual workarounds.

The result? More administrative strain — and a harder experience for students who are simply trying to access the education benefits they’ve earned.

We knew there had to be a better way.

Building the Hazelwood Workflow Through Real Collaboration

To ensure we built the right solution, we worked closely with Laura K. Schneider, J.D., a Veterans Officer at a Texas College, who provided invaluable insight into the day-to-day realities of managing both VA and Hazelwood benefits.

From compliance to process clarity, Laura helped us understand:

• Where the most time-consuming bottlenecks occur

• The back-and-forth often required to confirm eligibility and documentation

• The need for clear workflows that support both students and SCOs

• How critical it is to keep the student experience at the center of the process

This wasn’t a one-step build. It took extensive testing, feedback cycles, and refinement to ensure the workflow was practical, accurate, and easy to adopt.

Designed to Make Benefits Easier for Students and SCOs

The Hazelwood workflow was built with a simple goal: make processing easier without adding complexity.

The workflow helps institutions:

• Streamline documentation tracking

• Reduce repetitive back-and-forth

• Improve visibility into benefit usage

• Align Hazelwood processing alongside VA workflows

• Support SCOs with a clearer, more structured process

Most importantly, it helps ensure students can access the benefits they’ve earned with fewer delays and fewer points of confusion.

The Result: A Successful Launch

After rounds of testing and improvements, the Hazelwood workflow officially launched — and the feedback has been incredibly rewarding.

Laura shared the following after implementation:

“VA-Works has been a pleasure to work with! Our students are already giving us positive feedback regarding the platform, and we were able to quickly learn the new system. I really appreciate all your company does to assist SCOs so that we can help our veterans and their families efficiently access their educational benefits. I also loved that you were willing to explore Hazelwood processing. I will always be proud to have been a part of launching VA-Works.”— Laura K. Schneider, J.D.

We’re grateful for her partnership and for the trust she placed in our team throughout the process.

Putting Students First

At the heart of this project was one guiding principle: the student experience must remain the priority.

Veterans and their families shouldn’t have to navigate administrative complexity to access their earned benefits. By simplifying the backend process for institutions, we help ensure students can focus on what truly matters — their education and future.

Moving Forward

The launch of the Hazelwood workflow is another step forward in our commitment to innovation, collaboration, and service.

If your institution is looking to streamline VA and Hazelwood processing while improving the student and SCO experience, we invite you to learn more at:

👉 https://www.va-works.com/

Together, we can continue making veteran education benefits easier to access — and easier to manage. Written by Mary Baddam - Operations and Business Dev lead