‘Dear Soldier': Students extend taste of home to military overseas

By Andrew Dys - adys@heraldonline.com

Afghanistan is on the other side of the world. Every American military person there is away from home and families for the holidays. No way to make a trip to the corner store for candy or a package of crackers. Some have no cards from a child to put next to the bed at night. So students at the Children's School at Sylvia Circle again this year will send a little bit of home to the fighting men and women at war.

What these kids do is called, simply and elegantly, “Dear Soldier.”

More than 350 students at the Montessori school — the entire student body — send stuff by shoebox. Hundreds and hundreds of shoeboxes. All the stuff they send, from powdered apple cider to Tootsie Pops, is donated by the children and their families. All done so that a soldier these kids will never meet isn't so homesick.

The program, now in its 10th year, began with art teacher Laura Ashe, whose brother was stationed in Saudi Arabia even before the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“We found out that so many soldiers didn't get anything at all, so we just decided that we would do all we could to send as much as we could,” Ashe said.

That first set of boxes started a tradition that has grown into something that covers Ashe's entire classroom during November. The Rock Hill High Beta Club, an honors group, is in on the gig this year, and will send more than 100 boxes.

The goods have gone in past years to different places in the Middle East where soldiers are stationed: This year all the stuff is headed to a hospital in Afghanistan that serves soldiers and civilians including children, and a cavalry unit.

The kids love “Dear Soldier.” It is a project at this school devoted to peace and individual achievement and helping others, and the students race to be a part of it.

“I want them to know I am thankful for what they do for me and my family,” said Haley Benfield, 10, a Sylvia Circle veteran of this “Dear Soldier Project. “I love doing this,” she said.

Each child writes a letter starting with “Dear Soldier” and ending with their first name. If tiny kids are too small to write, bigger kids help. They use crayons and colored pencils. They draw pictures. They tell strangers in war zones that they are not forgotten.

Ashe sends hundreds of the kids' statements and questions to each soldier, too, which are compiled onto a few sheets of paper. “When you need hope, think of us, the children praying for you,” wrote 11-year-old Julia.

Sydney, 5, wrote: “I have brown hair and freckles. Would you like to be my friend?”

“Have you seen my Uncle Vance?” asked Mark, 7. “He is in the Army.”

Joshua, 5, asked, “Do you like to wake up early in the morning? Do you like to put on your shoes and your clothes by yourself?”

Chloe, 7, wrote, “I hate pink. Do you?”

And the immortal line from Kyle, 5: “I hate to brush my teeth, but they'll fall out of my head if I don't.”

The students even raise the money for shipping. It comes in through allowances. Some kids take it out of their lunch money. Parents give as much as they can.

This year, the donations are down a little bit. It's the economy, thinks Ashe. But the kids soldiered on. Ashe's daughter received a $500 grant to help defray the shipping costs.

On Friday, the kids started to finish packing the boxes so that Ashe could get all of it shipped in time to get to Afghanistan by Christmas.

“I do it because I want soldiers to know I didn't forget them,” said Charles Bennett, 9.

“And that they will feel better,” said Nathan Howle, 10.

Christina Reid is 9, and her little brother Isaiah Reid is 8.

“We need to show soldiers we care,” said Christina.

“The soldiers fight for our rights,” said Isaiah.

Spencer Long, 10, said, “Soldiers need to know somebody back here cares about them.”

Another Spencer, Spencer Holladay, said, “And they sure need a smile sometimes so that they can continue fighting another day.”

Jaz Mickel, 11, said, “They sacrifice their lives for our country. I can help them with a package from home.”

Isabelle Borduas, just 8, said, “The soldiers help us have freedom. They don't want to go away from home.”

A'Breona McCorkle, 11, put it like this: “I want to send something to a soldier because he is willing to give up his life to save mine.”

Mary Hope Ballou, who said she is not just 9, but 9 and a half, and therefore close to 10, said, “I want to show soldiers we are thankful they are risking their lives for their country, and my country, too.”

Some of the letters that come back from the soldiers talk about their own families or living conditions. Some contain pictures of the boxes and smiling soldiers amid deserts and craggy mountains.

One jet pilot promised to take the school picture up to the sky in his plane and take a picture of the world with the school's student body in the foreground. An Air Force colonel sent a letter on behalf of 4,900 airmen, saying the kids did the greatest thing in the world.

All letters have one thing in common: They have the words “thank you.” And some have blotched spots from where a soldier cried before folding up the paper and sending to kids in Rock Hill that he has never met, but who helped get him through that war to come home.

Want to help?

The Children's School at Sylvia Circle must send holiday packages for its annual “Dear Soldier” program this week. To donate, call 803-981-1380, or e-mail teacher Laura Ashe at lashe@rock-hill.k12.sc.us.

To read more of the students' messages to military personnel, visit heraldonline.com.