LYNN – Students in the Breed Middle School Leadership Academy got to learn first hand how important letters from home can be for soldiers serving overseas when Cpl. Jheudys Rivera stopped by for a visit.”I read a lot of your letters and I shared them,” Rivera said. “I was surprised, I usually get packages from my wife but you guys sent boxes, you are awesome.”Rivera grew up in Lynn, a child of the foster care system, a graduate of Lynn Vocational Technical Institute and soldier since 2008 with a tour in Iraq and another in Afghanistan under his belt.Leadership Academy Advisor Julie Collins said students began writing and sending packages to Rivera, an Army corporal, last year when he was stationed in Afghanistan.”Today Jheudys is stationed at Fort Bliss in Texas but they (he and wife Erika) surprised family in Lynn with a visit for Christmas and wanted to come and thank you as well,” Collins told students.Rivera entered the school’s assembly hall Thursday afternoon to an enthusiastic round of applause from the 20-plus students gathered for the event.”I was just like you guys once,” Rivera told the kids. “Young and stubborn. I made a lot of bad choices and some good choices. One of my best choices was to join the Army.”Rivera said he wasn’t there to recruit, if students wanted to enlist they would find their own way into the military, but he was willing to answer questions.”How hot does it get?””Are you allowed to sleep?””Is it true they wake you up at night just to yell at you?””Have you ever gotten your hands on drone technology?” These were some of the questions thrown at him.Rivera explained that he is an infantryman, trained in hand-to-hand combat as well as biometrics where he spends hours registering people’s fingerprints and iris scans.”It’s boring but it’s for a bigger purpose,” he said.He also told them the desert is very hot, up to 120 degrees in the summer. Basic training did involve a lot of being yelled at and pushed around but like the biometrics work, it was for a bigger purpose.”It was an obstacle,” he said. “It’s something you have to get past and it makes you a better person.”He also showed students his combat infantry badge and explained to them why he was proud to wear it.”Not everyone likes to wear theirs, but I’m proud to, I’ve lost a lot of friends there,” he said. “You can only get this badge once but you earn it every day putting your life at risk.”Rivera said he earned the badge when his unit became engaged in a gun battle during a routine visit to a village not far from his base in Iraq.”It was Dec. 27, just two days after Christmas,” he said.He and seven other soldiers were the last to leave the village and were almost out when they came under fire.”So we engaged. We did what anyone would do, we shot back,” he said, without going into further detail.Rivera urged students to always follow through on the mission at hand. He reminded them that a clear mind is important… and that Chapstick was the most welcome gift they sent.”Your lips get really chapped in that heat,” he said.He also told them to appreciate their family. He didn’t have a family growing up but he has since made one with his wife and the Army.Several students lined up to shake Rivera’s hand following his talk. They thanked him and he smiled easily at each one and said, “No, thank you.”