Sandra Dymerski, of Sand Lake, won first place and $100 in Montcalm Community College’s Achieve Your Dreams essay contest. 

Contestants submitted a one-page essay on what they would do or are doing to help others achieve their dreams. A panel of four judges read the essays and picked a winner. 

In her essay, Dymerski talks about working as a teacher’s assistant for middle school students. She wrote about how she tries to expose her students to different ways of life and new experiences. 

“My goal is to inspire them to embrace knowledge as if you love working out because you want to be stronger and fit, for your own benefit, to feel better, like when you accomplish something knowing that you became wiser,” she wrote.  

Heather Jackson, of Belding, Amanda Marvin, of Stanton, and Emily Throop, of Stanton, each were awarded $50 for their entries. 

Marty Mater, mother of Biology Instructor Dr. Michelle Gibson, has helped fund the contest since it began in 2013. 

The contest is part of the Achieve Your Dreams program which helps students identify their dreams and plan the steps necessary to achieve them. The library gives out booklets for students to write down their dreams and how they are going to accomplish them. The students can also get stamps for completing different activities around campus. Each stamp is worth a prize entry into a drawing for a gift card at the end of each semester.  

Gibson said the idea for the booklets came about from her childhood. Her dad always used to say “Dreaming’s free,” and she developed a bucket list of things she would do one day. When she started teaching, she realized some students didn’t have the same support of their  dreams at home, so she came up with the booklet idea. 

The Achieve Your Dreams program is supported by the MCC Foundation via the Mater Family Trust and the Dream Book program is supported by MCC Student Services. 

Media contact:
Shelly Springborn
Director of Communications and Public Relations
shellys@montcalm.edu
989-560-0833