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August 22, 2007

Local student chosen to help comfort soldiers

By Angela Weaherford

Little did Brittany Alexander know that the picture she was drawing in her 8th grade art class would end up overseas in soldiers care packages.

Last fall Alexander’s art teacher Ms. Rhonda Scott announced to her class that their next assignment was to draw a patriotic picture that might be chosen for a website for soldiers.

“I just had to think about it,” Alexander said of her drawing. “Once Ms. Scott received all the drawings she sent them to letssaythanks.com.”

The website, a program sponsored by Xerox, gives people the chance to say thanks to U.S. soldiers overseas. The company received several thousand pieces of artwork from children. The artwork was then sent to a panel of design professors where 59 were finally chosen.

Alexander was one of two pictures chosen from Athens. When Ms. Scott received the good news she told Brittany to go to the website to see her picture. Brittany and her family did just that and her mother saved the picture on their home computer.

“It feels good,” Brittany said, “because I like what the soldiers are doing for us.”

Brittany will continue with art classes when she starts high school this year.

To participate in this program you can go to www.letssaythanks.com, pick a design, and write a message to a soldier. The design is then printed out and put in a care package from “Give2TheTroops,” a non-profit organization based out of Connecticut.

The packages are sent from different state branches to randomly chosen soldiers.

“We really appreciate them,” one military Sargent said. “ The drawings by the children are wonderful, and they put smiles on our faces. We know that our mission is important, but it's nice to be reminded by others.”

The website launched in around July 4th.

“In the first few hours 10,000 cards went out,” Carl Langsenkamp, a Xerox spokesmen said.

To date there have been 11 million letters sent overseas.

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