User:RTWS1944/Connecting Generations Program

Connecting Generations
Connecting Generations is a program of The Greatest Generations Foundation (TGGF) which incorporates both veterans of WWII with college-age students in the fields of battle where the veterans fought over six decades ago.

History
The Connecting Generations program is an extension of TGGF's Battlefield Remembrance program in which veterans were given the opportunity to return to their fields of battle, at no cost to the veteran, in order to gain closure from their war experiecnes. Realizing the rapid and inevitable loss of the WWII generation, TGGF began incorporating college students into the program in June of 2009.

The first Connecting Generations program took place in early June when 20 college students were matched with 10 WWII D-Day veterans. The group traveled around England before crossing the English Channel and passing into Normandy. Once there the veterans were given the opportunity to revisit the beaches they stormed, the fields they parachuted into, and some of the towns they liberated. On June 6 the group attended the commemoration of the 65th Anniversary of D-Day at the cemetery at Omaha Beach. According to the students and veterans present, the program was a great success.

Recent Connecting Generations programs have been conducted to commemorate Operation Market Garden, the Battle of the Bulge, the Invasion of Iwo Jima, and the North African campaign in the European theater.

Operation: Common Ground
As an extension of the Connecting Generations program TGGF is in the process of collaborating with the Wounded Warriors program. Through Operation: Common Ground veterans from Iraq/Afghanistan will partner with WWII veterans to visit soldiers who have recently been wounded and pulled out of action in the Iraq/Afghanistan conflict.

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