Last week, Marine Corps Base (MCB) Quantico rang in Military Appreciation Month with the 10^th annual Smucker’s Mission: Breakfast event. Each year, Smucker’s hosts a friendly competition among military installation commissaries for the best in-store display of Smucker’s products. MCB Quantico won the 2019 grand prize for building the most creative display.

During the Single Marine Program (SMP) Days of Service this week, Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Miramar is volunteering with the USS Midway Museum to help restore some high-traffic areas that need a little extra attention. The museum, a premiere San Diego site and tourist attraction, is the historical USS Midway aircraft carrier housing actual naval aircraft in the city’s downtown area.

Ever since the inaugural Single Marine Program (SMP) Day of Service began in 2015, Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point has taken pride in supporting this observance through volunteerism each year. Now a weeklong event, the Cherry Point SMP has scheduled more than 40 volunteer service projects during the 2019 SMP Days of Service, from April 22 to 28. Participants will volunteer with a variety of organizations, especially those focused on hurricane recovery, to mitigate the damage caused by Hurricane Florence last year.

Now in its fifth year, the Single Marine Program (SMP) Days of Service week runs from April 22 until April 28, 2019. Incorporated into National Volunteer Month (April) and closely following National Volunteer Week, SMP Days of Service celebrates Marine community involvement and leadership and invites Marines to step up and participate in volunteer initiatives around the community.

The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has named April 27, 2019, this season’s semi-annual National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day.

The Department of Defense has kicked off its 15th annual observance of Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month (SAAPM) with the ongoing theme, "Protecting Our People Protects Our Mission."   This theme emphasizes everyone, regardless of rank, can protect our mission by making sure everyone is committed to creating an environment where sexist behaviors, sexual harassment, hazing, bullying, and sexual assault are not tolerated, condoned, or ignored.

In a brief video message to Marines, Sgt. Maj. of the Marine Corps, Ronald Green, kicked off the Own It! campaign saying, “we are all responsible for our own actions but, protecting the honor of the Marine Corps is a family business, and we all play a role.”  Own It! is a nine-week awareness campaign designed to start a discussion about getting off the sidelines and doing something, if you see something. 

It can, often times, be pretty easy to define a physically unsafe relationship.  It is a relationship where one or both partners are hit, pushed, or physically harmed in some way.  It becomes more complicated to determine if a relationship is emotionally unsafe.  

With thousands of Marine Corps children transitioning all over the globe at different times of the year, many states have been working to develop systems of support to ease transitions for military youth through policy action at the state level. 

Congratulations to 1st Lt. Lindsay R. Carrick, Officer Candidate School, MCB Quantico, Virginia, and Staff Sergeant Jason T. Pacheco, Wounded Warrior Battalion-West, MCB Camp Pendleton, California who have been chosen as the 2018 Marine Corps Semper Fit Athletes of the year.