Syracuse University has planned a series of events for Tuesday to honor the men and women who served in the United States military.

Events for Veterans Day on the SU campus include a National Roll Call on the steps of Hendricks Chapel, a Warrior Run, a Veterans Day Ceremony in Hendricks, a Veterans Day Luncheon and a Red Cross Blood Drive.

The Veterans Day ceremony, held each year in Hendricks Chapel, is the culmination of the day’s events. The ceremony will begin at 11 a.m. and Eileen Jevis, the communications manager at University College, said organizers are expecting more than 200 attendees.

“The highlights of the day are the keynote speaker, the University Singers and the ongoing support SU provides our veterans,” she said.

This year’s keynote speaker is retired Maj. Gen. John Batiste, U.S. Army. Batiste is a two-time combat veteran in the Gulf War and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Batiste served as the senior military assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense from 2001–02. Batiste was promoted to major general in 2002 and retired from the Army in 2005.

Both the SU Army ROTC and the Air Force ROTC programs will be present at the ceremony. Lt. Col. Michael Bianchi, professor of military science at SU, said the ROTC programs are there to honor the different eras of veterans.

“We want to honor the past veterans, the current veterans and especially those here at SU, which has grown immeasurably over the years,” he said. “We want to tie that together and celebrate the future veterans and we are, or at least the students that we have, are the future veterans of the United States.”

The first event for the day will be a National Roll Call on the steps of Hendricks Chapel starting at 5 a.m. SU will join other higher education institutions throughout the U.S. to read the names of more than 6,800 service men and women who have died since 9/11. The reading of the names is estimated to take about six hours.

At 6 a.m., members of the SU community will join SU ROTC units, local veterans organizations and military personnel to run a 2.2-mile “Warrior Run.” The run will start at the Orange Grove on the Quad and was organized by the College of Law’s V.I.S.I.O.N. program, which stands for Veterans Issues and Support Initiative and Outreach Network.

Joel DeLand, an organizer of the run and a student veteran, said the run highlights the veteran population at SU. There are currently 322 student veterans on the SU campus.

From noon until 5 p.m., a Red Cross Blood Drive will be held behind Steele Hall in the Quad 1 parking lot. The American Red Cross and the SU Veterans Resource Center are partnering for the blood drive.

– Asst. News Editor Justin Mattingly contributed reporting to this article.

Published on November 11, 2014 at 12:01 am

Contact Connor: clried@syr.edu