LA PLATA, Md. - Learning about community, responsibility, and helping one another are just some of the activities that students are involved in at the St. Charles Children's Learning Center at the College of Southern Maryland. As a part of these efforts, the St. Charles Children's Learning Center is sponsoring a soldier this year. Timothy Jason "T.J." Beavers, who joined the Army in March 2004 and is stationed at Camp Taji in Iraq, is a certified mechanic who works on helicopters and dreams of becoming an officer and helicopter pilot. Beavers is a family friend of Beverly Clymer, the director of the Children's Learning Center.
Throughout the year, the St. Charles Children's Learning Center will be collecting donations and sending him care packages each month. The care packages consist of items such as personal care items, phone cards, sports magazines and candy, along with banners, cards, pictures and words of encouragement from the children. Clymer says the children's parents are supportive and are helping with donations.
The center's first care package was sent in mid-November and was received by Beavers for the Thanksgiving holiday. Beaver's father, Timothy E. Beavers, wrote the center and noted, "The care packages you have put together and sent have been a phenomenal morale booster for T.J. and members of his unit." In a letter T.J. Beavers sent to the children, he wrote, "Everyone seems to like the pictures of the toddlers dressed up during Halloween, small stuff like that goes a long way…again, words can't explain how those boxes lifted mine and everyone's spirits."