$25K Donation Will Help Eastview Upgrade Library, Add to Literacy Programs

One Apple Valley resident's grocery purchase has paid off for her and a local school.

Literally.

Mary Vetter won $25,000 in a Discover card sweepstakes after buying groceries with her Discover card in March, according to a news release. Part of the sweepstakes provides that Discover will match the $25,000 in a donation to the public school of the winner's choice.

Vetter chose , where she sat on the committee to decide where to build the school and has had three sons attend. She still volunteers in the library, Eastview Principal Randall Peterson said, though her children have since graduated.

"She’s one of those types of people that is always giving," Peterson said.

Eastview will use the money to upgrade the library, Peterson said, which is in transition from a traditional library to a "learning commons" that is meant to better support all the technology available to students.

He said school officials already were planning to implement better wireless access, upgrade Kindle and Nook e-readers and create an environment that encourages studying and casual reading. They were actively seeking the funding for it, he said, as they do with other improvement projects.

"This time it came to us," Peterson said. It's rare to get a large cash donation without strings attached, he said.

Some money also will go toward literacy programs at the school, he said. Eastview Reads was a new program this year to encourage reading among students; he said the school could expand that program to the greater Eastview or Apple Valley community to involve parents, as well.

Vetter has dedicated her life to helping others, Peterson said, and has been a "mainstay" at Eastview.

Vetter said in the release that the winnings are a blessing to her family, but that's not the only reward.

"What is even more of a blessing is that winning this prize gives me an additional opportunity to give back to the school I have dedicated much of my life to since it was built 14 years ago," Vetter said.