Eight students from WVU’s P.I. Reed School of Journalism participate in “Take a Veteran to School” in schools throughout northern West Virginia, helping to link veterans to students and capture and preserve veterans’ real-life experiences as a part of American history.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller is hosting the second annual event, which will take place in 13 schools across the state from Nov. 9-19. Participating schools are: Brooke High School, Parkersburg High School, Morgantown High School, Robert C. Byrd High School, Hurricane High School, East Fairmont High School, Huntington High School, Buckhannon-Upshur High School, Capital High School, Musselman High School, Fayetteville High School, Summers County High School and Bluefield High School.

The public relations student team from WVU will assist in executing the events and lead efforts to interview the participating veterans about their wartime experiences for official submission to the Library of Congress. In addition, the students will assist in capturing and documenting each event through still photography and video. The team’s overall goal is to collect 24-28 veteran stories for submission to the national project in 2009.

“Our veterans have served our country and given so much of themselves to keep us safe. Bringing veterans into schools across West Virginia to share their stories is an incredible real-life history lesson that will have a meaningful impact on our students,” Rockefeller said. “The Library of Congress’s Veterans History Project is an absolutely remarkable project that has been working for almost a decade to collect the invaluable stories of our American heroes and I am happy that they are a partner.

“I am honored to participate in this event again this year,” Rockefeller said. “Both our students from WVU and Concord University, and our sponsors from the WV Cable Industry and The History Channel™, make this project a success.”

Since 2003, the WVU Perley Isaac Reed School of Journalism has played an integral role in collecting the stories of West Virginia’s veterans for the Library of Congress American Folklife Center Veterans History Project.

School of Journalism students and faculty have recorded oral histories and collected photographs and other archival materials for submission to the national archive and have trained civic and community groups in the recording and submission process as well. Efforts spearheaded by the School of Journalism have led to the submission of more than 200 West Virginia veterans’ histories to the national project.

—WVU—

jb/11/06/09

Contact: Kimberly Brown
304-293-3505 ext. 5403, kimberly.brown@mail.wvu.edu