BC3 professor spearheads Flag Day project Students, staff sign cards for center residents
BUTLER — Eighty greeting cards, each featuring the photograph of an American flag and signed by a Butler County Community College faculty or staff member, student or administrator will be presented on Flag Day to military veterans residing at a Veterans Affairs community living center in Butler and whose service spans from World War II to Operation Desert Storm.
The project spearheaded by Cheryl Macon, a BC3 business professor, honors the sacrifices of the 60 veterans, ages 50 to 99, who are residents of Butler VA Health Care's Sgt. Joseph George Kusick Community Living Center.
“I have a long history of military in my family,” said Macon, a BC3 educator for 30 years whose ancestry includes a Revolutionary War major and two privates. “I was raised to respect the military and appreciate what our current servicemen and women, and our veterans, have sacrificed and what they are doing for us.”
Macon is a paternal descendant of Maj. James Dougan and Pvts. Jacob Scouter and Theodorus Scowden, who served in the Revolutionary War. Her ancestors include those who fought in the War of 1812, the Civil War, World Wars I and II and the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Her maternal cousin has served in the Navy since 2012.
The community living center provides, among other services, skilled nursing care, rehabilitation, and hospice and palliative care and, said Maryann Capuzzi, the center's recreation therapist, is home to three veterans who are 99, and 10 who served in World War II — two of whom were prisoners of war and two of whom fought in the Battle of the Bulge.
Macon's idea, Capuzzi said, “is great. It lets them know that people are thinking about them, care about them, that they are not forgotten, and that there are still people out there who have a sense of what they did for the country.”
All four main branches of the U.S. military are represented by residents living at the center, Capuzzi said.BC3 has been named a military friendly institution five times by Victory Media. More than 100 student-veterans in the spring semester attended BC3's main campus, or its additional locations of BC3 Armstrong in Ford City; BC3 Brockway in Brockway; BC3 Cranberry in Cranberry Township; BC3 Lawrence Crossing in New Castle; or BC3 LindenPointe in Hermitage, according to Stella Smith, BC3's veterans coordinator.BC3's Class of 2019 included 32 student-veterans.Kendra Hile and Lauren Broad, students in Macon's human resource management class, joined Arabelle and Dominic and Cameron in signing the cards for the veterans.“It is important to thank those who served,” said Hile, a 19-year-old business management major from Fenelton whose maternal great-grandfather was a prisoner of war. “It's the right thing to do. We wouldn't be where we are right now if they didn't fight for us.”Broad, 20, a human resource management major from Slippery Rock, said her brother, Ryan, will enlist in the Army following his graduation this spring from Slippery Rock High School, and that she decorated her card “with pretty stars and hearts.”“They gave so much to our country by leaving their family and friends and giving up their freedoms for all of us,” Broad said. “I hope the card will make them happy, that it will make their day, and show that people care. I am sure it will be meaningful to all of them.”Flag Day dates to 1916, when President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation for a June 14 observance, according to va.gov. President Harry Truman signed the observance into law in 1949.
