A total of 25 veterans made appointments for free attorney services at Valor Day, the most in the program’s history to date. The event offered free legal, career and financial counsel to veterans in Dineen Hall on Saturday.

Valor Day, or Veterans’ Advocacy, Law and Outreach Day, is an event coordinated by the law student organization VISION. At Valor Day, giving back to veterans entails centralizing free legal, career and financial services so a veteran can go to one place and get help for three or four different issues, said Matt Crouch, the president of the organization.

Two students who have since graduated from Syracuse University’s College of Law established VISION, or Veterans Issues, Support, Initiative and Outreach Network in 2012. The organization currently has about 40 students, and 15 of those students volunteered at Valor Day for pro bono credit.

Since the launch of VISION, more than 250 veterans and their families have utilized the services provided at Valor Day, according to an SU News release.

“It’s really important because I’m not a veteran. And so it’s important to me — I’m the son of a military veteran – to do something to give back,” Crouch said. “I think that not being a veteran is more of a reason to join this organization to see what we can give back to the men and women that served.”

Representatives from other organizations such as Syracuse Vet Center, Soldier On, Red Cross, Salvation Army and SU’s Institute for Veterans and Military Families set up tables with information about their missions in Dineen Hall’s main lobby. VISION networks with these organizations based in the greater Syracuse area at the Central New York Veterans Expo at the New York State Fairgrounds, Crouch said.

“We just try to network with them, and we hope that by inviting them to our event that they invite us in return to their event and we can just sort of grow each year,” Crouch said.

Veterans also have the opportunity to speak with Veterans Affairs representatives about benefits and social security issues, or have their resumes reviewed by the College of Law’s Office of Career Services.

The resume review service is helpful for younger veterans because “a lot of times, younger guys getting out of the military have a lot of trouble translating the skills from the military into the civilian workforce,” Crouch said.

The proudest moment during Crouch’s time at VISION happened last November when he said he ran into a veteran who had attended Valor Day at the Vet Expo at the New York State Fairgrounds in Syracuse. The man had been struggling to find work after getting out of the military and came in on Valor Day to have his resume redone by the Office of Career Services, Crouch said.

Months later, when the man saw the members of VISION at the expo, he went up to them and thanked them, because the first time he sent out his professionally reviewed resume, he got a job, and had been there for a year. Crouch said the man directly related getting that job to his experience at Valor Day.

“I think that one really made an impact on me because it made such a profound impact on his life, and he was just so thankful,” he said.

“It’s for a good cause,” Crouch said of Saturday’s event. “We get a lot of people the help that they need.”

Published on August 30, 2015 at 9:34 pm

Contact Alexa: atorrens@syr.edu