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Clay High students giving presents to soldiers in Iraq

Dec- 2-2006 » Filed Under: 3/2 SBCT

By BETH REESE CRAVEY, Clay County Line

In assembly line fashion, the Clay High students assembled shoe boxes full of gifts, from CDs and playing cards to cookies and stress balls.

Then they moved to another table to add phone cards and greeting cards and grab pieces of wrapping paper.

At a third table, they put everything together to create holiday gift packages, all destined for a U.S. Army unit in Iraq.

The school day Wednesday was over, but they stayed afterward for a special wrapping party, keeping in mind the soldiers who would do the unwrapping.

"It's important to give back," said junior Katie Ralph, "because they have given so much."

And they are missing so much, being away from home.

"Even though it's the Christmas season, we're still thinking of them, over there," said senior Candis Miller.

Supervising the action with occasionally misty eyes was science teacher Charlynn Campbell, whose 23-year-old son Steven is a member of that faraway unit. He knows about the shipments coming from Clay High - the rest of his unit does not - and gets to be Santa Claus when the packages arrive. Some of those soldiers never get mail, much less gifts, she said.

"They work very hard ... It's going to mean a lot to the boys," she said.

"It breaks my heart, the ones who don't get anything. They offer so much and have so much to give...


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