Spring Branch ISD Featured News

After hosting an increasingly popular Veterans Day Celebration for 18 years in its gymnasium, Spring Forest Middle School will host its first-ever Nov. 11 gathering at a bigger venue – the district’s Don Coleman Coliseum, used for athletic events and annual high school graduations.

Since its start, this middle school event has grown into one of the largest held in west Houston, drawing dozens – and then hundreds – of local military veterans and their families to the Memorial neighborhood campus. 

Veterans and their immediate family members, as well as local residents, are invited to attend the first Veterans Day Celebration at Don Coleman Coliseum, 1050 Dairy Ashford Road. The event will begin at 9:15 a.m. on Monday, Nov. 11, with a veterans honor parade inside the coliseum. 

A group breakfast for veterans and family members will also be held, beginning at 7:45 a.m. on the same day. Guests should enter from Dairy Ashford to park.

Spring Forest Middle Principal Raymorris Barnes noted that student enrollment at the school this year is up over projection. The school has also absorbed about 50 more students in the district’s Spring Branch Academic Institute serving the very highly gifted. In brief, there’s not enough room to seat everybody.

“We don’t have the capacity anymore to safely hold all of our students inside the gymnasium with veterans and guests in attendance as well,” Principal Barnes said. “So in true Texas fashion, we said ‘Either go big, or go home!’”

Hundreds of middle school students, staff and event participants will be bused to the coliseum. Spring Forest Middle’s event will remain student-led. Announced as Veterans Day masters of ceremony are students Sophia Benner, Caroline Graham, Anna Hoskovec, Madeline Molly, Jona Morford and Erin Sakolosky.

In addition to a parade of veterans with sustained audience applause, the event is filled with stirring and patriotic band, orchestra and choir music. A solo trumpeter will play both “Reveille” and “Taps” at chosen moments in the heartfelt program. 

Once again, Texas A&M University representatives with Patriot Paws, a service-dog related group, will be on hand. A Veterans Day school service project raises funds for Patriot Paws annually. Service dogs and their handlers often attend.

This year’s guest speaker is Lt. Col. Damon “Sam” Robins, a Special Forces “Green Beret” officer and recent commander of the Houston Recruiting Battalion. A U.S. Army Officer Candidate School graduate, he was commissioned in 1998. 

Lt. Col. Robins earned his bachelor’s degree in accounting from Gardner-Webb University in Boiling Springs, N.C. He also holds a master’s degree in defense analysis from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif.

As a Green Beret officer, Lt. Col. Robins deployed and commanded Army units in the Global War on Terrorism response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, also known as Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF). 

He also commanded U.S. troops in support of Iraqi Freedom and Inherent Resolve campaigns, as well as supported operations spanning Iraq and Syria. The Army officer has seven combat rotations, including Afghanistan in 2005 where he received the Purple Heart following an IED blast. He was awarded four Bronze Stars, two in Iraq and two in Afghanistan. 

His multiple distinctions range from Parachutist and Air Assault Badges, to Army Ranger and Special Forces Tabs.

Under a speech titled “#Service”, Lt. Col. Robins will encourage teens to do more and be better Americans. “My intent is to encourage young people to honor their veterans through a life of service to their family, neighborhood and country. I will not necessarily make a specific call for them to serve inside the military, but to serve others and to ensure that our nation continues to prosper,” he said in advance of the event.

Spring Forest Middle’s PTA has supported this event since its beginning.

Bobcat Sponsors this year include: Melanie White: Re/Max Westside Realtors; Jennings Orthodontics; Chick-fil-A (Memorial at Dairy Ashford); Laird Law Firm; J. Carter Breed Properties; Wendy Swantkowski, DDS; Raising Cane’s; Town & Country Orthodontics; and American Wheel & Tire.

Veterans Day donations by local families and businesses include: Karen and Jim Martin/BHGRE Gary Greene; Chick-fil-A; Starbucks; Panera Bread; Face Paint by Stormy; and Houston Delicioso Catering. 

To event RSVP or for more information, please call Jana Gwinn at 713.251.4618.

Separate, campus-based Veterans Day events are also planned at several SBISD schools this year. Please check with your neighborhood campus for local details.