Morgan County JROTC focuses attention on veteran suicides
For the Enquirer
Motorists driving by Brewer High School this month will see more than 100 flags planted in the grass near the front doors as members of the Morgan County JROTC program seek to bring awareness to veteran suicides.
“We are planting 147 flags today, and each flag represents a veteran in Alabama who committed suicide last year,” said JROTC battalion commander Piper Wright. “Currently, in the United States, there are 6,400 (veterans) who commit suicide every year, which involves 22 to 24 every day that do. On top of that, they don’t even count the ones who overdose and such.” In front of the flags, a sign reads, “Remember and Honor the veterans in Alabama who lost their lives to suicide.” September is National Suicide Awareness Month, and the JROTC program wanted to bring awareness to veteran suicides and mental illness.
Wright, a senior at Brewer High, said every year the JROTC program completes a service project to raise awareness and funding for Huntsville-based Bearded Warriors, a nonprofit dedicated to assisting veterans in north Alabama with suicide prevention and mental health counseling. Wright led the project last year and the program raised $1,500 for Bearded Warriors. This year the goal is $2,000 and JROTC instructor Col. Bennie Pokemire said they are well on their way.
“They raised $720 in just one day,” Pokemire said. “That was from donations at the football game. They let us take donations at two games, so we took donations from the first game and we’ll take donations on (Sep. 13).” Assistant Principal Brooke Hudson said every year, the JROTC program strives to help wounded veterans in the area, while also serving as positive role models to other students in the school district.
“It’s always at the forefront of their mind,” Hudson said. “The pride that they have for helping wounded veterans is remarkable and we’re just so thankful for the JROTC program.” The JROTC program will host a bake sale at the Eva Frontier Days during the week ending Sep. 28. Proceeds from the bake sale will also go toward Bearded Warriors.
Pokemire said he wanted the project this year to be special, something the whole Somerville community could see.
“I met a woman from the Vets for Hope organization at the career tech conference in Mobile this summer and she talked about the opportunity to do this,” Pokemire said. “This is a perfect spot to plant these because this is where everyone drives to drop off or pick up. There could be a veteran in a car that is struggling, and they see that someone cares.” This school year, the JROTC program has 83 students, including 15 seniors. Pokemire said he had sev-eral seniors in the program last year who are now completing basic training in the military.
“We had four that went to basic training and one that went into the Coast Guard Academy,” Pokemire said. “If I’m not mistaken, we had 20 seniors graduate from the JROTC program last year.” Brewer High junior Lily Rogers is leading the program’s service project this year and she said their goal was to have at least five or six local businesses commit to the project’s funding.
Wright said mental illness and suicide rates in the military have risen over the years, and a contributing factor is the financial battle soldiers must fight at home once they survive their battles overseas.
“A lot of them who make it out of these wars, they’re disabled, such as losing a limb or conditions that they can’t reverse,” Wright said. “These veterans who left their homes, they weren’t able to make that back up because, in this economy, they can’t really get that far with all this inflation.”
