A partnership between the Think GREAT Foundation and Lakeville South High School is providing gifts for some unsuspecting veterans and unforgettable memories for the students tasked with making the gifts.
Think GREAT, a nonprofit founded by Erik Therwanger, awards scholarships to military and veteran spouses during its annual Homefront Heroes Gala, which is scheduled to take place Friday night at Brackett's Crossing Country Club in Lakeville.
"I'm a Marine Corp veteran and I know how tough military life can be, but I also witnessed firsthand how hard it is for the families, especially the spouse," Therwanger said. "They're constantly uprooting and find it tough to find work because people know they're a military spouse and may have to leave. They give up a lot of things including time investing in themselves."
While the gala is focused on the spouses, veterans are surprised to learn there's something special waiting for them, too, thanks to the hard work from students at Lakeville South High School.
"For the past several years we've done a project where we make gifts for veterans to celebrate and honor their service," said Dan Rawley, a STEM teacher at Lakeville South. "A few years back we made some gifts and we were looking for different events where we could distribute them to vets. We came across Erik's program and grew from there."
The woodworking projects have proven to be a hit. Last year, students made wall mounted bottle openers, complete with the names of each veteran etched into metal and the seal of their respective military branch.
"I think it catches the veterans off-guard," Therwanger said. "When they show up and we're recognizing spouses, they're extremely glad to be there. When we have a program specifically for their spouse, they love it. When they have a gift in the back, I think some are caught off-guard in a good way."
Along with honoring veterans, the projects give students a hands-on learning opportunity.
"First off, we have to decide on the project and that's always a brainstorming activity," said Lakeville South STEM instructor, Kurt Weber. "A lot of kids don't necessarily have the skills to run some of the equipment, so this is a great way to learn it."
In general, the program requires a lot of critical thinking, problem solving, and failure which Weber says are core components to learning.
"On these gifts for this year, it's a design process so there's a lot of measuring and prototyping," Weber said. "We go back and forth until we land on the final design. Then it's kind of teaching them the process of teaching them how to mass produce 60, 70, or 80 gifts in a timely fashion and do it in a quality fashion."
Students use everything from power tools, to laser engravers during the building process.
"Even kind of the standard kids haven't used power tools so when they touch the trigger on that, it'll make them jump sometimes," Weber said. "They quickly adapt to it because they want to do the project, be involved, and they want to give back. There's always some hook. We find really cool things to do and that leads them to step out of their comfort zones."
In the end, what's created, is more than just a gift.
"A lot of people that serve don't really seek the attention for it, or seek praise or thanks. But when somebody does recognize their service, especially younger kids, it really means a lot to vets," added Rawley, who is a veteran himself. "Especially our Vietnam veterans and how they were treated and have been treated. This goes a long way towards making amends there."
Therwanger has witnessed that impact firsthand.
"We've had Vietnam veterans at our gala who've said it's the first time they've been recognized for their service outside of the military. So for a lot of them, they don't serve to be recognized, but when they are, it goes a long way. The amount of talent and skill the students put into these projects come through. I think the veterans like the gifts more when they find out it was high school students who made them."
Weber says awhile back when to Lakeville South students took the building materials to show middle school students how to make the gifts as part of a capstone project.
What happened next is a moment he believes the students won't ever forget.
"When they were presented to people in uniform at the gala, and you see people who served their country breakdown and cry, it impacts these kinds. In this case the two boys were 17 years old. You talk about the impact that has on a person. They're doing it for the right reason, they want to do it, but they don't really understand how much it means to someone who isn't seeking the attention or praise. It impacts them way more than we ever do in school. They'll talk about that for rest of their life."