Photo By NAVCENT Public Affairs | 160519-N- AX559-090 QUWERIA JORDAN (May 19, 2016) During Exercise Eager Lion students...... read more read more
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By Lt. Alex Cornell du Houx, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command Public Affairs
AQABA JORDAN – Jordanian and American forces are working together to support the King Hussein secondary school in rural Quweria Jordan as part of exercise Eager Lion 16.
“It’s great to finally start working directly with the children of Quwaria,” said Army Capt. Blaine Powers, Team Leader of Civil Affairs Team 8325. “This bilateral exercise between Jordan and the U.S. benefits all the people the Jordan and allows us to conduct a mission hand in hand with our Jordanian civil affairs counterparts.”
Powers and his team have been working with the Royal Jordanian Armed Forces to evaluate and provide support to rural disadvantaged schools in Jordan. The Jordan Directorate of Civil Military Affairs (DCMA) was established last October to support this mission.
Previously Powers traveled to rural parts of Ghana Africa, rebuilding a school.
After working as a medical service officer, he joined Civil Affairs “as a way to work on preventing conflicts and building relationships with our partners.”
“This school is far away from any kind of city – most people work as farmers, so not enough money is collected to support the school,” said Lt. Mazen Hanaqtah with the Royal Jordanian Navy. “One of our missions in DCMA in Jordan is to look for those people who need the help and provide it to achieve our mission and help the community.”
“Today’s mission is to deliver school supplies to 800 students,” said Hanaqtah.
The supplies were donated by the Spirit of America charity. Spirit of America is a veteran run and founded charity that combines fast, flexible support to deliver economic and humanitarian assistance when and where service members and diplomats say it’s needed most.
"We're proud to be able to meet a critical local need and help strengthen a key partnership in the context of this exercise," said Zack Bazzi, Middle East Project Manager for the Spirit of America.
Staff at the school wrapped the supplies to provide a gift to the students that included everything from notebooks, pencils and rulers. Jordanian and American service members then took turns giving the gifts to the smiling students.
“This is the first of many projects with the school,” said Powers. “We are looking forward to continuing our partnership to support the education and children of Jordan.”
| Date Taken: | 05.19.2016 |
| Date Posted: | 05.22.2016 20:38 |
| Story ID: | 198728 |
| Location: | AQABA FREE ZONE, JO |
| Web Views: | 324 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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