{"id":380026,"date":"2022-11-21T06:06:51","date_gmt":"2022-11-20T20:06:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=380026"},"modified":"2022-11-21T06:06:51","modified_gmt":"2022-11-20T20:06:51","slug":"5-nmc-students-receive-sinmi-grant-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/5-nmc-students-receive-sinmi-grant-award\/","title":{"rendered":"5 NMC students receive SINMI grant award"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Front, from left, the first \u201cLive Your Dreams\u201d recipient, Leah Murphy, poses with the 2022 Live Your Dreams recipients Jennifer Benavente, Mollie Atinisom, Angellyn Nicholas, Maritoni Duarte, and Kelly Sablan.\u00a0At the back, from left, are Soroptimist International Northern Mariana Islands past president Marilyn Marron, SINMI president Maureen Sebangiol, treasurer Merle Byrd, Suzi Perez, Soroptimist Live Your Dreams chair Jessy Loomis, president of Soroptimist Marianas Jessica Castro, SINMI member Yijia Zhao, Joann Aquino and secretary Pam Brown Blackburn. (LEIGH GASES)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Five Northern Marianas College students were presented this year\u2019s edition of the \u201cLive Your Dream\u201d awards by the Soroptimist International NMI last Saturday at the Azucena Hall of the Crowne Plaza Resort Saipan. The five recipients are Jennifer Benavente, Angellyn Nicholas, Mollie Atinisom, Kelly Fujihira Sablan, and Maritoni Duarte. This makes it the first time for SINMI to present the award to five persons; last year, they presented the grant award to three persons.<\/p>\n

A total of $7,000 was given to the awardees, with an additional $1,500 given by the Rotary Club of Saipan. Benavente was awarded $3,000, while Nicholas, Atinisom, Sablan, and Duarte were awarded $1,000 each. Benavente, Nicholas, and Atinisom were given an additional $500 each from the Rotary. There were a total of 13 applicants this year.<\/p>\n

The \u201cLive Your Dream\u201d program aims to improve the lives of women in the CNMI by providing financial assistance for their education, skills, support for their families, and or business ventures. The awardees have to be women who are in college, while also being the head of their household.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a cash award because they don\u2019t need to necessarily spend it on school. It goes to a woman who is getting her undergraduate degree, [whether it\u2019s for an] associate\u2019s, a bachelor\u2019s, or even trade\u2019s degree. \u2026It\u2019s not a scholarship. \u2026 We don\u2019t ask for an explanation of how you spent the money. \u2026 It\u2019s just to encourage women to still be able to stay in school,\u201d said SINMI president Maureen Sebangiol about the award.<\/p>\n

Benavente, a full-time employee, mother, small business owner, and NMC student, said that her children are what drives her. \u201cI can honestly say I don\u2019t know if I will feel this way, this inspiration, this motivation, without my kids\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

With the award, she said, \u201cIt\u2019s a cash award and I laughed because [Maureen Sebangiol] said you can use it to buy tires, and that the first thing I thought was, \u2018Well, my baby needs some new tires.\u2019 [But] it\u2019s mostly going to go to savings. Christmas is coming up and my two kids deserve a good Christmas every year.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked about winning the award, Benavente said, \u201cTalking about your struggles and your challenges\u2014it\u2019s not something I like to talk about because it\u2019s easier to have pride. It\u2019s easier to say\u2026that I don\u2019t need help. I swallow that pride and I tell myself that my struggles and my challenges do not define me\u2014they shape me to be a better person. So, I\u2019m grateful for the award, very grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recent Marianas High School graduate, 18-year-old Angellyn Nicholas, who is now a freshman at NMC pursuing a nursing degree, said, \u201cRight now, it\u2019s pretty tough and I\u2019m so grateful for this wonderful opportunity from the Soroptimist award, because it showed me how hardship isn\u2019t everything\u2014pain is temporary. I\u2019m just very, very grateful to be a part of it\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just wanted to share that pain is temporary and blessings will come,\u201d said Nicholas.<\/p>\n

Atinisom, a ChaCha Ocean View Middle School librarian aide, who is majoring in education, rehabilitation, and human services at NMC, said, \u201cWhen I got that call, I was really shocked because I was actually struggling with how I was going to pay for school this year. I wasn\u2019t able to qualify for a lot of the financial aids that were out there. So, it came as a blessing for me. \u2026It felt like a miracle. \u2026I\u2019m just [going] straight to the finance officer, \u2018Here you go, here\u2019s my check.\u2019 The goal next year is to find another financial aid to pay for my last year. I feel blessed, really fortunate to be able to get it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sablan, 31-year-old U.S. Army reservist who is also a full-time student at NMC, said that winning the award was \u201csurreal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI honestly didn\u2019t think I was able to win. I saw the email in my NMC email and I was like, \u2018Wow, I didn\u2019t even know they had this and let me try,\u2019 and I did it. And when I got the call, I kind of freaked out because I didn\u2019t think that I was [going to] get it. \u2026I was really happy, I\u2019m still thinking that it\u2019s not real, but here we are today at the ceremony. \u2026 It just seemed like it all happened so fast. It was just like over a week because I turned it in right before the due date,\u201d said Sablan.<\/p>\n

Duarte, a business administration student at NMC and a Community Guidance Center outreach worker, said that \u201cwinning this award means a lot because\u2026 it helps me continue what my dream is. \u2026One day, I want to get into my master\u2019s and hopefully get into health administration to open a homeless shelter here in the community. I\u2019ve seen a lot of homeless individuals. As I\u2019ve started working with the Community Guidance Center, I\u2019ve seen a lot of gaps, and I want to bridge those gaps so that we can provide as many services as we can to those individuals who are really in need. And I feel like that\u2019s one thing that we need here, to build stronger communities to support.\u201d<\/p>\n

The keynote speaker of the night was Crystal Cabrera Pangelinan, a current Family Court Division manager at the NMI Judiciary, who gave an inspirational speech about her life and pursuing her dreams, followed by the first \u201cLive Your Dream\u201d recipient in 2014, Le\u2019ah Aguon Murphy, who is an educator and administrator at ChaCha Ocean View Middle School.<\/p>\n

The ceremony was attended by SINMI members and friends and family of the winners, and was followed by a banquet and a silent auction.<\/p>\n

For more information about the SINMI or the Live Your Dream awards, contact Sebangiol at (670) 287-4674 or email\u00a0maureen2cpr@gmail.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Five Northern Marianas College students were presented this year\u2019s edition of the \u201cLive Your Dream\u201d…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":380027,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[2115],"class_list":["post-380026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-sinmi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=380026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/380027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=380026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=380026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=380026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}