The Panther Valley Elementary School recently had a book and DVD collection for veterans at the Wilkes-Barre VA Medical Center Family Support Facility and the Gino J. Merli Veterans Center in Scranton.

The idea started when the Navy Club of Carbon County was giving a flag program at the school in the fall. One of the teachers asked if there was anything the school could do to help veterans.While discussing this idea with Henry Desrosiers, Carbon County Veterans Affairs director, it was determined that both veterans centers needed books and DVDs for the residents.When the idea was discussed with Mary Figura, principal of the Panther Valley Elementary School, she said, "We were looking for a project to involve the students with a community service type project, this would be ideal."The book drive was kicked off with assembly programs where Desrosiers explained what the veterans centers did for the veterans, and the needs of the veterans for some items for making their stay at the centers more pleasant.The collection proceeded during the first week of May.On May 8, members of the Navy Club collected the books from the individual homerooms.The books, DVDs, CDs and all-occasion cards were counted, and the three winning homerooms were: third grade, Mrs. Scarcella; third grade, Mrs. Wickersham; and kindergarten, Mrs. Bonner.The items were sorted and separated by Navy Club members and were presented last week to the two veterans centers.Deb Schlosser, Chief Voluntary Services at the Wilkes-Barre VA, was delighted at the number of books and items received."On behalf of all the veterans at the center we are very grateful to the students at Panther Valley Elementary School," she said.At Scranton, the books and items were presented to Michael Semian, commandant of the center, and Lynn O'Day, special assistant to the commandant."It's wonderful that the Panther Valley students can be involved with a collection of these items for the veterans," Semian said. "It's commendable for all of the hard work the students did getting this done."The total number of items collected included 1,020 books, 77 puzzle and word search books, 255 DVDs, 102 CDs and 835 all occasion cards.The Navy Club of Carbon County, Commander Scott Reinhart, is proud to have assisted the Panther Valley Elementary School on this special project, and looks forward to doing other projects to help veterans.