Stars, stripes and even a few hearts embellish cards handmade by Summit Academy School – Lorain students, thanking military veterans for their service. The veterans will receive these greetings of gratitude at the Lorain County Veterans Office on Veterans Day and for the remainder of the month.

Angela Davis, community outreach coordinator for the Summit Academy middle and high school, came up with the idea as she reflected personally as the daughter of a military veteran.

“I can tell you that what inspired this project is the fact that this topic is very near to my heart. My father is a Vietnam Veteran and one of his favorite activities around this time of year was going to my kids’ school for their Veterans Day,” Davis says. She adds that with COVID-19, many events commemorating veterans have been canceled. The personalized greeting cards, she hopes, will fill some of the void left by the pandemic.

Both students and school staff members made patriotic cards. The roughly 60 greetings are slated to land in the hands of area veterans by or around Veterans Day. Davis expects they will be received with the same heartfelt joy with which they were made.

“I felt that this would be a good way to bring smiles to others in our community,” she says.