Pen pals in service meet the Coralville students who brightened their holidays

CORALVILLE - The video chat finally connected and students jumped up, waving to and cheering for their faraway pen pals.

''Sup dude!” one student called out.

On a large screen, a pair of deployed United States service members grinned back at the students.

'We're coming to you from an undisclosed location in southwest Asia nine hours ahead of you, and it's already dark here,” Staff Sgt. Rik Zortman told them, a little after 9 a.m. Friday in Coralville. 'We want to wish you guys a merry Christmas and a happy New Year.”

The Kirkwood Elementary students' connection with the service members began last month, when they first sent letters to them overseas - including those on their screen, Zortman and Tech. Sgt. Keisha Harris.

'This is kind of their ‘thank you,'” said librarian Lisa Beal, who organized the schoolwide project. 'They wanted to see the kids.”

Beal, who met Zortman through an Iowa running group earlier this year, worked with him to get students' letters and gifts to members of the U.S. armed services who don't receive much holiday mail.

Zortman, of Avoca, is well-known for running routes that spell out the names of loved ones. The first name he spelled was his 3-year-old son's, who died of brain cancer.

In total, Beal said the school's kindergarten through sixth-grade students sent more than 360 letters to Zortman, Harris of Louisiana, Tech. Sgt. Adam Graham of Arizona and Airman 1st Class Donovan Jansen of California.

The project was a simple way for students to spread kindness, Beal said, to some of the many U.S. military members who won't be home for the holidays.

About 200 Iowa Army National Guard troops are currently deployed overseas, said Lt. Col. Michael Wunn, a spokesman for the Iowa National Guard. Some are stationed in the Middle East, while others are posted in a region that includes Central America, South American and the Caribbean.

President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered troop withdrawals from Syria and Afghanistan, and Wunn said it's too soon to know if the decision will affect deployed Iowa soldiers.

Iowa guardsmen currently in Afghanistan are expected to come home in June, Wunn said.

For Zortman and Harris, their tour somewhere in southwest Asia should come to a close next month.

'Sometimes I miss the food,” Harris told students on Friday. 'But being here, I've got to experience a lot - a different culture, different food, it's just really different - but I've been enjoying it. I really have. I've met some great people and I love the company.”

Harris is on her fifth overseas deployment while Zortman is on his fourth, they said.

The soldiers and students talked about hot desert weather, their uniforms and video games before students sang 'Jingle Bells” and had to sign off.

'I really enjoyed them. They help save the world,” Queren Bungo, 10, said on her way back to class. 'Saving people, that's really cool. They're kind of like super heroes, even if they don't have a costume. They still save people, and I think they're really cool.”

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