HAMPTON ROADS, Va. (WAVY) — Today’s a big day. All across the country, television stations that are a part of our parent company, the Nexstar Media Group, are announcing the local winners of our Remarkable Women Contest.
We want to thank each of you who nominated ladies you love for our contest. Out of many, there can only be one winner. But, if you’ve been watching in the evenings over the last four weeks you know that we celebrated Women’s History Month 2021 by highlighting some of Hampton Roads best.
Over four weeks, we met four truly remarkable women making a difference in Hampton Roads. They are all amazing in their own way.
We’re grateful for Pam Blais’ commitment to helping our healthcare heroes. Her Pantry Box Project has worked with 36 local restaurants and delivered over 10,000 meals to area front-line workers at nine hospitals, now even getting help from Mercy Chefs to keep giving back.
Jessica Collins is a nurse, business owner, U.S. Navy wife, and mother to four children ages 13, 8, 6 and 3 years old. Need we say more? Patients Choice Home Healthcare of Chesapeake is more than a business to her. She’s used a passion to go above and beyond that was born out of the pain of losing her mother in August to transform lives.
Then there’s Amber Egyud, chief nursing and operating officer at Chesapeake Regional Medical Center, who’s been serving as the incident commander during COVID-19, too. So many people let us know about her kind heart and compassionate leadership from the moment we asked you to tell us about great women in your lives.
But there can only be one winner of our contest. And this year, that’s Pastor Dawn Michelle Williams.
“I am plugged into purpose for His glory,” said Williams. “And I just believe that when you plug into purpose, your purpose will keep you going. I feel like I have supernatural energy. I tell people sometimes I feel like the energizer bunny. I just keep going and going.”
She’s an educator, motivator, entrepreneur, sister, mother, friend, and now our local Remarkable Women Contest winner for 2021.
Williams has been a teacher in Norfolk Public Schools for over 20 years, selected as Teacher of the Year twice. During the pandemic, she’s been a site coordinator for a program that prepares free bags of food for people.
She created a prayer group to help people through this tough year and even launched an online church that’s been giving book scholarships to deserving single mothers. She is absolutely remarkable and we’re so happy for her.
She’ll be receiving a few gifts from 10 On Your Side and we will be donating $1,000 to a charity on Williams’s behalf. She chose to make that contribution to the Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia and the Eastern Shore.