My perspective on MyCAA

I have watched the whole MyCAA thing unfold on facebook and I have been deeply disheartened to watch spouses' valid frustrations with the program turn inward to ripping on other spouses. That's not cool.
This program, which offered tuition assistance to military spouses was wildly popular, which was why it was taken offline and revamped in ways that are insulting at best:
1) Assistance is restricted to associate degrees and certificate programs, which means that even traditional military spouse portable careers will not be supported by this program (e.g. nurse, mental health professional, teacher). This restriction significantly limits military spouses' choices to low wage jobs...not careers.
2) Because of rule #1 above, diploma mills, which prey on military families will receive more tax dollars for providing largely worthless certificate programs.
3) Rank restrictions. While I am not opposed to officer rank restrictions, mostly because I find that Senior Jefe and I live quite well on what we make, I do question enlisted rank restrictions.
4) The statement that we can just use the servicemember's GI bill. This, again, is more viable for officers' spouses, because officers already have a degree and can get a master's from the military. But enlisted servicemember's need to get some sort of education if they decide to leave the military or work after they retire, so those benefits need to be saved for them.

If someone had asked me what I think is fair, I would have voted for O-3 and above phase out of the program and support for at least a BA/BS in high demand careers. I know they can't afford to give us everything, but if we could be more self-sufficient by hiring our own teachers, scientists, nurses, and mental health professionals, we would save a ton of money that is currently funding some of the crappy contracts that the gov't is paying for.

In addition, I think we should use our group purchasing power to negotiate an across the board tuition rate for military personnel and spouses at all schools receiving federal aid. These could be different for AA/AS, BA/BS, MA/MS, and PhD levels, so that the $4000 goes a lot further. At some of the schools I have attended, I could exhaust all $4K in under a semester. But this would allow the GI Bill, MyCAA, and any other funding military families secure to go a lot farther.

These are just my thoughts, but it seems to me that it would make more sense to spend our money more wisely and try, in particular, to help spouses become qualified for well paying careers that support the mission,  rather than qualifying them for jobs that pay next to nothing.