JROTC flooded with donations
Warren County High School JROTC instructor Ernest Brewington and his students put out a call for help, and people answered.
The only problem is after receiving thousands of donated items for our troops, Brewington and the JROTC classes are having trouble finding the means to ship them to the soldiers of the 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment, who are set to ship out to Iraq this month.
It has taken staff and students almost a month to gather up the items donated, Brewington said, and he is hoping members of the community will step forward to help with shipping.
“For the kids, it’s a service learning project and we thought it would be good to collect these items and send them to the troops. We’ve made posters, announced it, put boxes out throughout the school and the response has been overwhelming. It’s super,” he said.
Things as simple as soap, shampoo and razors were among the items, which consisted of many types of personal care items and a variety of snacks. Brewington, a Vietnam veteran, said he doesn’t know what it’s like to be in Iraq but said during his time of service, those kinds of items were difficult to get.
“I know for a fact that items like this were very hard to come by,” he added. “You don’t have a local store on the corner or anything like that and if we can ship these directly to the unit from McMinnville, that’s what we want to do. That’s our next big problem is shipping this. We’re guessing at probably $1,500 for postage to mail it over.”
Anyone wanting to help out may contact Brewington at 668-5903.