Seven years ago Dave Pepper owned a moving and storage company and thought his life was going along just fine. But one evening a disgruntled former employee barged in and shot Pepper and two other employees in the head as they lay face down. Pepper was the only one to survive. He has had to re-learn to walk, talk, eat, and dress himself. Today he focuses his life on his spirituality and on his education, which has begun again at WCC.

"I use my mind now instead of my body," says Pepper. "Thank God for the WCC Foundation. They pick up where the Pell Grants leave off."

Because Pepper ran his own business, he didn't think he needed an education. But now he is working hard to pursue his dreams of helping others by getting his degree in counseling.

He participates in the M-TIES program, now renamed M-POD, that smoothes the transition from WCC to the University of Michigan. In the meantime he has become a minister.

"I don't take life for granted anymore. I love learning but I have to study twice as hard because I have memory problems," says Pepper. "The College and the WCC Foundation have literally taken me by the hand and made my new beginning possible. God, in his glory, directed my path to WCC and to the Foundation."