Cleveland Middle School Students Honor Veterans

By Rick Wells, The News On 6

CLEVELAND, OK -- The purpose of a school project at Cleveland Middle School is to learn more about the freedoms we have and who helped preserve them. The teacher responsible for the project, Jennifer White, was looking for a way to help students understand our freedoms.

She called her project "Home of the free, because of the brave."

Jennifer White is a history teacher at Cleveland Middle School. In addition to a unit on U.S. presidents, the class is involved in a year-long project to contact and send thank you letters to veterans. It's a measure to help students understand what freedom is.

"And how it wasn't just something we got. It was earned for us by the men and women who have fought, and we have kept it because of them," said Jennifer White.

So she started gathering names and addresses of veterans from friends and family, anyone she could find. She would get a veteran's name and address, then she would give those names to students and they would write the veteran a thank you letter. Some of them have written back.

"The kids are thrilled and every day, ‘did we get another letter,'" said Jennifer White.

So far they've written 180 letters and have gotten 57 replies. Student Kelbie Newman got a reply on Monday.

"Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future... sincerely John McCain," read Kelbie Newman.

The class has written to all of the senators who served and five have replied. Not every student has been so successful. Student Derek Reeves hasn't received answers to his letters, but he'll read the honoring speech at a Veterans Day assembly.

There is a wall of honor, full of pictures of veterans brought in by students and friends, putting a face on our freedoms.

The school is having a Veterans Day assembly on November 11th at the middle school in Cleveland at 10 a.m. The public is invited to attend.