Southwest Missouri schools send packages to soldiers for the holidays

What started as a summer project to pack a few boxes for soldiers, developed into a huge project with an outpouring of community support from businesses and schools across southwest Missouri. Over the summer, the Willard FFA Chapter joined forces with the Greene County 4-H Teens on a National Days of Service Grant to commemorate the 20th anniversary of 9/11 to pack several boxes with the help of Willard North Elementary that were sent to soldiers.
After sending these boxes, the chapter was notified of 13 soldiers stationed in Korea that would not receive anything for Christmas. This inspired Willard FFA members to take action and continue their Shoeboxes for Soldiers Campaign into the holiday season. Our initial goal was to make sure these 13 soldiers would receive a care package for the holidays. Then our Building Communities Committee met and decided to expand the goal in the hopes of being able to pack and ship 100 boxes. The question of how the chapter would afford to pay for the shipping of these boxes was the biggest challenge, as well as where the supplies would come from. After reaching out to local businesses of Willard and surrounding areas, nearly $2,500 was received for the shipping of these boxes. The Fair Grove, Pleasant Hope, and Willard school districts worked together to gain the essential supplies to fill these boxes.
While only asked to gather supplies, many elementary students went above and beyond to write special messages and words of encouragement to these soldiers. Because of the vast support financially and in the form of our box components, the Willard FFA members were able to pack 112 boxes to send to our troops stationed across the globe. The Willard FFA Chapter would like to thank the supporting school districts as well as DeLong Plumbing, Ozark Fence, Top Hat, Farmer’s Insurance-Kip Baker, Glenn’s Auto, Freedom Bank, Farm Bureau Insurance-Dexter McIntyre, Willard Car X, Corbin Campbell, Ron Crighton, MO Sand Blasting, Main Street Feeds, Shelter Insurance-Tim Viles, Bill’s Custom Woodworks, and Mid-Missouri Bank for their financial support.
The Willard FFA plans to continue this project as a tradition and only hopes to expand the project in the years to come.