Trenton Soroptimists Honor Awards Recipients

Photo from left: Kenya Harper-Black, Paul Moma, Diane Moma, Diana Nunez

Three local women were recognized with monetary awards from the Trenton Soroptimists for their ambition and contribution to society. The honors banquet was held on March 20 at Trenton’s Grand Event. Several judges, local professional and business people, were in attendance to celebrate with the winners and their families. The Midwest Region Governor, Vivian Walczesky and District 3 Director, Darcy Merritt, joined the festivities. The applicants were evaluated on a set criteria and essays that assessed their contributions to women and society. Soroptimist is an organization of almost 1,500 clubs in nineteen countries for and by dedicated women who use their collective power to help other women and girls transform their physical, mental, and emotional lives and the lives of their families.

Judging for the Virginia Wagner Educational Grant is based on women attending a college or university with an effort toward scholarship, extra-curricular activities, and financial need. Megan Moma, the winner from Grosse Ile, was born in Alaska where experiencing marine life gave her a love of nature. Animals helped her tough transition to her move to Michigan in the sixth grade. She started horseback riding and caring for neighbors’ pets to lift her spirits, and she knew she wanted to pursue a career related to animals. Miss Moma enrolled at Grand Valley State University in the fall of 2017 with a major in Biology and emphasis in Ecology and Evolution, and plans to volunteer at the Grand Rapids Zoo. Megan wants to obtain a graduate degree in Marine Biology with the goal of saving animals and their environment. She has applied to a Coastal Research Lab at Southern Mississippi University and Alaska SeaLife Center in Seward, Alaska. Megan has worked at various jobs to save money for college while taking AP classes. She earned her highest GPA doing all of this in her senior year. Her personal challenge during her adolescence was a diagnosis of partial anodontia (most of her adult teeth never formed), which required multiple dental surgeries of bone grafts and implants. Megan’s parents, Diane and Paul Moma, received her award while she was busy attending her classes at Grand Valley.

To qualify for the Soroptimist International of Trenton Area’s Soroptimist Prime award, a young woman who is attending high school in our five-city region must be actively helping to make her community and world a better place through volunteer efforts. This year’s recipient is a senior attending Grosse Ile High School. Diana Nunez found her “calling” to serve during middle school after helping at The Friendly Center, a place where children who received meals in school were fed during the summer. Her early experience led to her volunteer work at Gleaners Community Food Bank as a speaking ambassador in which she spreads awareness of this worthy operation. Diana’s efforts have recruited over forty volunteers to join Gleaners. In addition to her volunteer work at Gleaners, she implemented a hunger project in the kindergarten class in which she teaches at Sacred Heart. Diana also assists in the PB&J Ministry to make bagged lunches for homeless shelters. As a member of her Grosse Ile High’s cross country and track teams, Diana logs miles in an app called “Charity Miles,” which donates twenty-five cents per mile to “Feeding America.” She and her teammates have raised about $1600.

The Live Your Dream award assists women who have the primary financial responsibility for their families to obtain the skills, training, and education necessary to improve their employment status and standard of living for themselves and for their families. It helps women who have faced economic and personal hardships to live their dreams. Kenya Harper-Black from Redford is a student at Baker College in Allen Park majoring in Human Services. Kenya has had to endure and overcome some harsh realities in her life. Her many childhood dreams were derailed when she was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis in her freshman high school year. Despite her disability, Kenya graduated from high school, albeit with some literacy difficulty and without a plan or direction for her future. She wandered through various purposeless jobs until, at age 26, her daughter was born with a disability. Believing that God had blessed her with a special needs child because he knew she could handle the challenge, Kenya found her life's purpose and the courage to face her fears and overcome any obstacle. To help teach her daughter to read, Kenya took classes to improve her own literacy and began writing poetry and children's books. Because of her daughter's disability and her own disability, she began studying healthier living techniques and ways to develop better parenting skills. She became involved in school volunteering and the community, advocating for people with disabilities. Kenya credits her daughter and being the parent of a special needs child with making her the woman and mother she is today. Despite limited resources and being wheelchair bound, and despite her husband being unable to work due to back surgery, Kenya is pursuing a Bachelor of Human Service degree from Baker College and plans to graduate in June of 2020. She continues to work for Michigan Alliance for Families, a non-profit which helps families with special needs children and hopes her degree will lead to further advancement there. Kenya is an active volunteer in numerous community organizations: the Redford Interfaith Relief Church for low-income families, the Michigan Special Education Advisory Committee, the Starfish Family Services Wraparound Team, the student group RISE at Baker College, and Michigan Alliance for Families. She is planning to publish a coloring and activities children's book on how to interact with children who have disabilities and to start a support group that provides free workshops on strategies for healthy relationships and financial literacy for those families. She is pursuing her dream and is this year's Trenton Area Soroptimist Live Your Dream award recipient, as well as winning district top honors and being runner-up at the regional level.

If you are interested in learning more about Soroptimist, visit on Facebook at Soroptimist Trenton, MI or the website: sioftrentonarea.wixsite.com/si-of-trenton-area#!