Tweet

On Tuesday, October 6, Grand View University and Des Moines East & South Chamber joined forces in an event to celebrate the development on the East side of Des Moines. This year, Grand View has renovated their new student center and built a skywalk with the help of several eastside businesses. The Celebration of Progress event and fundraiser, was also designed to celebrate the Des Moines East & South Education Scholarship recipients and award the 2015 Educator of the Year.

Director of Finance and Operations at Capture Marketing, Carl Lingen, hosted the event and awarded scholarship recipients in a presentation that featured President Henning of Grand View, speaking on the behalf of the University.

“This student center project is actually the capstone of about 15 years of reactive construction on our campus,” Lingen said. “What we’ve been doing here is trying to build the kind of university that we want to be on the East side.”

Each year, the DMESC uses money raised by their Chamber events to present scholarships to high schools and colleges to pass along to deserving students within their schools. This year, DMESC honored $5,000 in scholarships to five schools with accredited programs. Each school received $1,000: AIB, DMACC, East High School, Grand View University and Lincoln High School.

Along with the annual Education Scholarship awards, the DMESC asks for nominations of an exemplary educator in the area to receive their Educator of the Year award. This award goes to an educator who is dedicated to teaching profession and works for the advancement of East or South Des Moines students. This year’s 2015 Educator of the Year was Melaine Fedders of Jefferson Elementary.

Fedders is an active member of the community supporting events around Des Moines and spends her time helping to create a safe play space for students and spends time at Jefferson PTA meetings to stay involved and up to date with communication not just for how PTA can help the teachers, but also in how the teachers can better assist the parents.

Local business professionals, South Suburban YMCA, Iowa State Bank, Greater Iowa Credit Union, Mercy College of Health Sciences, West Bank and other surrounding local businesses attended the DMESC Celebration of Progress event and took notice to the impact that Grand View’s presence is having on the surrounding neighborhoods. Craig Krouch, vice president of West Bank’s south side office, said the progress being made at Grand View has upgraded the entire community.

“I really think a lot about Grand View and what they have to offer the student, not only just for the classes in their degree, but with the type of help they get on managing their education and paying for it,” Krouch said “Grand View works very well with the residential around here and I think people have come to appreciate what’s been done.”

Vice President of Academic Affairs and Provost for Mercy College of Health Sciences, Steven Langdon, also shared positive thoughts about the university’s changes.

“Particularly on campus, view and vision, and the immediate area around Grand View is, from what I can tell as an outsider, making a big difference at least in the appearance and the effectiveness of what goes around this local area, ” he said. “When you keep the appearance that Grand View has made with it’s new faculties and upfront image, it will do a lot to help the community gain more respect and pride.”