Class Councils will take a different approach to 11-11 Day events this year, hoping to extend the honors given to military service-members for Veteran’s Day from a single day into a year-round awareness initiative.
Elizabeth Hoelscher, business administration sophomore and Class Councils public relations committee chair, said Class Councils is focusing its philanthropic efforts on serving veterans.
“We feel that we should honor the veterans throughout the year and not just on one specific day, however we will be having a flag display and [will be] putting the flags in the ground like we have in previous years,” Hoelscher said. “But we also want to show support to specifically the Aggie veterans throughout the year and just raise this money for an awareness for the Aggie Ring fund and show how we can give just a small token of our gratitude back to the veterans that served for us.”
Hoelscher said Class Councils has in previous years raised money for the Aggie Rings for Veterans scholarship fund with a silent auction during the Texas A&M veterans appreciation game, along with selling 11-11 Day T-shirts on campus.
“This year we’re actually extending that into the spring and we’re not doing an auction during the game, it’s just like an awareness more so of 11-11 Day,” Hoelscher said. “So we’re actually doing an auction during parents weekend in the spring time.”
Danielle Snow, communication sophomore and co-chair of the 11-11 Day committee, said Class Councils will also sell T-shirts, but they are still finalizing the design and hope to have them on sale by the end of the week.
Snow said Class Councils has recognized one Texas A&M student veteran for the 11 days leading up to 11-11 Day.
Snow said this recognition effort began to help students become more aware of the 1,000-plus student veterans at Texas A&M. Snow said Class Councils also hopes to highlight the difference between a student veteran’s college experience and that of a typical college student only a few years removed from high school.
Mary Katherine McNabb, international studies freshman and Class Councils public relations committee member, said Class Councils has been building relationships with veterans’ organizations on campus.
“We’ve been able to work really strongly with veterans’ organizations on campus and build relationships with them and increase awareness, and just really make the event a little bit bigger than it was in the past, and instead of making it a singular day making it a year-long awareness in how to bring these veterans — who are typically a little bit older — into the fold of student life of A&M,” McNabb said.