Duluth Middle School, Support Our Troops Campaign
Duluth Middle School, Duluth, GA
Project: Making a Difference: Support our Troops Campaign
Adviser: Sylvia Barteaux
The National Junior Honor Society (NJHS) chapter at Duluth Middle School felt the urgency to do something in support of troops fighting overseas. They decided to send Christmas packages to troops serving in the Alpha Company 1st Battalion 121st Infantry Georgia National Guard. They wanted to send 125 packages to the troops in the mountains just outside of Zormat, Afghanistan. These packages contained chewing gum, toothbrushes/toothpaste, DVDs, hand sanitizer, baby wipes, and snacks. Overall, they wanted to make certain that the soldiers know that the members were always praying for them and will do everything they could to support them.
The members began by gathering donations for the 125 packages. To accomplish this, they organized a school-wide donation drive. For two weeks, students from Duluth Middle School donated items for the packages. With participation from the entire school, they soon reached their goal. Following the collection, they put in countless hours before and after school sorting and packaging 125 bags for the troops. In each bag members placed a toothbrush, toothpaste, 2 packs of gum, snacks, baby wipes, hand sanitizer, lip balm, and a small Christmas ornament.
After approximately one week with joint efforts from members, teachers, and volunteers, they managed to pack 125 large plastic bags filled with items and plenty of love. Following this, they created a banner with the school name and signatures of all of the NJHS members. After all the bags were filled, they still had roughly five boxes filled with toothpaste, shaving cream, and many other items. They decided to donate all of the extra items to Hugs for Our Soldiers, a non-profit volunteer organization that has been supporting our troops since 2003.
The next step was to ship the packages to Afghanistan. Fortunately, the organization Veterans of Foreign Wars sponsored the shipping cost. The Veterans of Foreign Wars is an organization that "honors the dead by helping the living" thorough veterans' service, community service, national security and a strong national defense. After one month of teamwork, the boxes reached soldiers in Afghanistan. The soldiers received the packages and were extremely thankful to Duluth Middle School for the support and the gift bags. As a token of their appreciation, the infantry sent the students a banner of their own.
The students and staff at Duluth Middle School spent many painstaking hours carrying out their service project. All of the members of the chapter and the student body at Duluth Middle School contributed towards the success of this project. Without the students’ donations, this project would not have been as successful. More than 50 hours of work was put into making this project a success. The members were successful in bringing the joy of the holiday season to our brave soldiers serving overseas.