Students ate free food, played games and showed their support for veterans at an event on Thursday.

The Students Veteran Association hosted the Military Appreciation Day event to celebrate military veterans and encourage students to show their support to them.

“People don’t realize that they’re able to come to school because of the things that veterans actually do,” Sarah Baxley, a second-year business management student, said. “Be there for the veterans [and] for their families.”

This is the first time that the Student Veteran Association hosted a military appreciation event, according to Baxley, a veteran.

“[This event] is really exciting because we get to push, you know, the remembrance … of veterans everywhere to a generation that might not even think about it,” Baxley said. “They might not think about, you know, the reasons that [veterans] joined up or how necessary it is to protect your country.”

Baxley, an organizer of the event, said joining the military can be life-changing.

“I was a lost kid [before I joined],” Baxley said. “I had pretty much nothing to my name or anything. I was homeless for quite a period of time even at some point, and I found my family in the service. … I was able to completely change the trajectory of my life.”

Antonio Martin, a first-year visual game art and design student, said being in the military taught him a lot about “personal responsibility,” “growth,” “time management” and “professionalism.”

It’s important for military members to feel like they are a part of the college community, according to Martin, a veteran.

“[There are] those of us who are service members but don’t feel the same as the rest of [the] students,” Martin, an organizer of the event, said. “It’s important that … we can still … come to school and interact with our people and … be members of the community.”

Joey O’Toole, a second-year physical therapy student, said it’s important to remember what people are “willing to do for the country.”

“It can help us connect with … the military,” O’Toole said.

Kristin Ross, a fourth-year radiology tech student, said we “shouldn’t take [veterans] for granted.”

“[This event] means appreciating, like, what they do for the country,” Ross said.

Laila Floran, a second-year transfer studies student, agreed.

“If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t be able to be doing this right now,” Floran said. “I want to thank everybody for putting this together.”