Departing service members will soon have access to a "reverse boot camp" that offers new veterans more robust transition services, said President Obama in a speech Monday afternoon before the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Reno, Nev.

Traditionally known as TAP (transition assistance program), the program has long provided service members with information about benefits as well as workshops on career options and job search skills. Veterans' advocates, however, have in recent years urged substantial changes to the program as the unemployment rate for former service members exceeded that of the national rate. Last August, the president convened a task force to overhaul TAP for the first time in 20 years.

The new initiative extends TAP from a three-day workshop to five to seven days, which includes a financial planning seminar, a redesigned employment workshop and a planning session in which service members can explore career options and talk to experts.

Service members will be also be able to meet with a counselor to discuss their career goals as well as VA benefits and resources.

"We'll provide the training they need to find that job, or pursue that education, or start that business," Obama said. "And just as they've maintained their military readiness, we'll have new standards of career readiness."

That training will also include the option to take a course tailored to a service member's specific career interest, whether it be a higher education degree, credentials in certain skills or small-business ownership.

The changes to TAP will be fully implemented by the end of 2013.

The unemployment rate for all veterans in June was lower than the national average at 7.4 percent, though the rate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans was 9.5 percent.

Heather Ansley, vice president of veterans policy for the advocacy organization VetsFirst, told NBC News that the substantial changes promise to give service members more individualized guidance on how to successfully transition from military life.

"We’ve known for some time that TAP wasn’t fulfilling its mission of preparing folks," said Ansley.

By offering service members individualized counseling and job readiness sessions, Ansley said, TAP can better prepare new veterans based on a variety of factors, including their education, career goals and physical or psychological disabilities.

Ansley is hopeful that the TAP initiative will also help service members answer logistical questions about life outside of the military, including what to do without housing benefits and how to calculate what kind of paycheck is needed. The changes, she said, will help veterans learn "how to make that transition without being surprised."

Rebecca Ruiz is a reporter at NBC News. Follow her on Twitter here.

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Liberty Legal Institute via AP file

The war memorial known as the "Mojave Cross" sat on an outcrop known as Sunrise Rock in the Mojave Desert until it was vandalized and stolen in May 2010.

A federal judge has approved a land swap that could end an 11-year legal battle over the right to display a cross memorializing war veterans in a remote part of the Mojave Desert.

U.S. District Judge Robert Timlin in California on Monday signed an order that will allow the Mojave Cross to return to Sunrise Rock. According to the settlement, the National Park Service will transfer the title for the one-acre parcel on which the cross sat to the Veterans of Foreign Wars post in Barstow, Calif., in exchange for five acres of donated land.

The parcel is near the community of Cima, about 12 miles south of Interstate 15 in the Mojave National Preserve, a 1.6 million-acre park established in 1994.

The VFW erected a wooden cross at the site in 1934 as a tribute to fallen World War I vets. The cross was later replaced with one made of steel pipes.

The cross stood quietly for 67 years until the American Civil Liberties Union sued in 2001, contending religious symbols shouldn’t be displayed on public land.

After a district court ruled that the cross shouldn’t be displayed on federal land, Congress passed legislation directing the Interior Department to transfer an acre of land including the cross to the VFW in exchange for a parcel of equal value.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in April 2010 that the cross may stay but also sent the case back to the lower courts to review the proposed land swap. The next month, vandals tore down the 7-foot-tall cross and made off with it.

Liberty Institute, a nonprofit legal group that represented the VFW, said the settlement approved Monday paves the way for veterans to eventually restore the memorial. The group had launched a national awareness campaign dubbed “Don’t Tear Me Down” to bring attention to the cause.

“This is a great victory that brings the veterans one step closer to restoring this World War I memorial to its rightful place in the desert and in history," Hiram Sasser, litigation director for Liberty Institute, said in a news release. "We are pleased the government and the ACLU could resolve their remaining differences and begin the healing process for the millions of veterans who have endured this case for over a decade."

The ACLU did not immediately return a telephone call for comment.

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The next step is to complete the land exchange, which could happen before the end of the year, the National Park Service said.

After the swap is finalized, the Park Service will install a fence around the parcel with signs indicating that the plot is private property.

“We look forward to working with the Veterans of Foreign Wars in completing the land exchange,” said Mojave National Preserve Superintendent Stephanie R. Dubois in a press release. “We are requesting that everyone be patient as we complete the land exchange, and we would like to remind folks that no cross can legally be displayed until the land exchange is complete.”

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