When the Flags of Valor Foundation went looking for a state to lead the largest hands-on civics initiative of America’s 250th year, it didn’t choose Virginia, where the company’s veteran craftsmen build every flag. It chose Alabama.

The 2026 Alabama Kids Kit Initiative aims to put a wooden American flag-building kit — 100% American-made and designed by combat veterans — in the hands of 250,000 students across every school district in the state, backed by a $2.5 million sponsorship goal. Two hundred fifty thousand kits for America’s 250th birthday.

Governor Kay Ivey put the state’s stamp on the effort this week during National Summer Learning Week.

“Civic education is the missing piece our country has been searching for,” Ivey said in a cinematic video posted to X.

“Proud Alabama is leading the Flags of Valor initiative, where students learn history and honor the brave who defended it. That’s a lesson they’ll carry long after the classroom.”

Civic education is the missing piece our country has been searching for.

Proud Alabama is leading the @FLAGSofVALOR initiative, where students learn history and honor the brave who defended it.

That’s a lesson they’ll carry long after the classroom.#NationalSummerLearningWeek pic.twitter.com/lwtnhhPS7U

— Governor Kay Ivey (@GovernorKayIvey) July 7, 2026

Alabama wasn’t a market analysis for founder Brian Steorts. It was a homecoming.

Steorts began his military career as a paratrooper in the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division before leaving active duty to earn his business degree at the University of Alabama — where he also met his wife.

After Sept. 11, he returned to uniform as an Air Force special operations pilot, flying eight combat deployments before a service-related injury ended his flying career. The woodworking he took up in recovery became Flags of Valor, the veteran-owned and veteran-operated company he launched in 2015, which has since donated more than $1.7 million to veteran and first responder causes.

“Alabama has always held a special place in my heart. It’s where I attended college, met my wife, and entered military service twice—first into the Army and later into the Air Force. Our children have grown up spending every summer with family and friends on Smith Lake and in Orange Beach, making Alabama a place we’ll always cherish. That’s why it was so important to launch our Flag Building Kit initiative here,” Steorts said.

“We believe every student deserves the opportunity to better understand the American flag, our nation’s history, and the freedoms it represents. By giving students a hands-on experience, we hope to strengthen civics education and inspire the next generation to appreciate both the freedoms we enjoy and the responsibility to preserve them.”

The rollout runs through the Alabama Expanded Learning Alliance, which is recruiting afterschool and summer programs statewide for what it describes as a national pilot Alabama was selected to lead.

Participating programs receive a Civics Activity Guide along with free individual flag-building kits. Students assemble their own wooden American flag while learning the meaning behind its colors and symbols and the foundations of American self-government — then deliver the finished flags to veterans and nursing home residents in their own communities.

It is the second time this year Ivey has planted Alabama’s flag on civics education. In February, she launched a statewide push urging Alabama high schoolers into the Presidential 1776 Award, the national civics challenge run in partnership with the U.S. Department of Education, predicting, “I expect an Alabama student to be standing at the top.”

For once, the education story out of Alabama isn’t about where the state ranks. It’s about where the country turned first.