Honor Credit Union announces winners of 12th annual Teacher Awards

Published 10:10 am Wednesday, November 24, 2021

By Sarah Culton

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SOUTHWEST MICHIGAN — Honor Credit Union recently announced the 12th Annual Teacher Award winners.

With each year that passes, the Annual Teacher Awards continues to grow, and 2021 proved to be a record-breaking year with more than 1,200 entries from educators submitting a short essay explaining how they would use an additional $200 to better their students’ education.

Honor kicked off the 2021 Annual Teacher Awards in August by announcing 70 teachers would receive $200 each to use towards their classrooms. However, after receiving over 500 more entries than the previous year, Honor’s team members chose an additional 32 Honorable Mention winners who would receive $100 each. The giveback, however, did not stop there. Seeing the impact Honor could make for teachers and their students was invaluable, said business officials. Honor’s community assistant vice presidents selected an additional 11 teachers who would receive various classroom supplies to help fill requests, totaling the number of awarded teachers to 113.

In total, 70 teachers were blindly chosen to receive $200 as the winners of the awards. Listed are the winners from Leader Publications’ coverage area:

  • Tamara Nelson (Berrien Springs Public Schools) Amanda Harris (Berrien RESA)
  • Angela Roeder (Brandywine Community Schools)
  • Melissa Calvillo (Buchanan Community Schools)
  • Amanda Solloway (Cassopolis Public Schools)
  • Reggie Fritz (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Susan Grear (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Suzanne Brooks (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Denise Halgren (Edwardsburg Public Schools)
  • Kaylan Wiemuth (Edwardsburg Public Schools)
  • Rebecca Coleman (Edwardsburg Public Schools)
  • Brandy Meiser (Heritage Southwest ISD)
  • Elizabeth Grow (Niles Public Schools)

Honorable mentions from Leader Publications’ coverage area include:

  • MacKenzie Shelton (Brandywine Community Schools)
  • Kelly Smith (Buchanan Community Schools)
  • Claudia Zebell (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Cari Soderbloom (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Debra Wegner (Dowagiac Union Schools)
  • Erik Kimbler (Edwardsburg Public Schools
  • Rikki Jones (Niles Community Schools)

Each honorable mention received a $100 Amazon digital gift card. In addition, Jennifer Bloss and Jessica Pompey of Cassopolis Public Schools were selected, along with nine others, to receive classroom items.

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