"The Veterans Project," by Tim K. portrays veterans in a way you've never seen before — and it all started with a graduate capstone project.
"It started off pretty simple," he said. "I covered four people from my capstone project — ten questions each, nothing major, nothing massive, nothing groundbreaking. But the reaction from civilians even early on was very profound. I felt like people could relate to us."
"You could hear a pin drop after I finished talking about this guy I'd covered with 90% burns across his body," he said about his final capstone presentation. "The whole room was dead still. And I realized I had something pretty powerful, and if you can build a bridge to that civilian side then you know you've made a good impact. That's led me to where I am now."
The Veterans Project had a rocky start — nine out of every ten veterans who were asked to profile turned him down.
"I started out with a 90 percent rejection rate — you've got to get past that first layer. It was pretty tough."
Now, he has to limit the number of profiles he takes on to 12 to 14 a year — preferring his projects to focus on quality over quantity.
"Each project goes on for about a month. I want people's lives to be properly honored, and I feel like in order to do that you've got to show the full gambit of who that person is."
But the popularity of the project, to him, doesn't mean his work is anywhere near over.
"I don't think the project has fully succeeded until every single person knows what we've gone through. I don't know if I'll ever consider it completely successful," Tim said. "But my goal is to impact the civilian community — to help civilians better understand what reintegration looks like because there are so many challenges that we face."
"Our stories are important," he added. "Our legacies are important. At the end of the day that's all we have."
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