Last week’s Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce Membership Appreciation Event was supposed to be a night for the Chamber to thank its members. But when four awards were handed out, the evening also became a reminder of how much of what holds the 98848 together happens quietly, long before anyone stands at a podium to recognize it.
TL;DR
Marie Weinand Rylaarsdam was named Volunteer of the Year for years of service to the Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce, including regularly staffing its front desk and helping at Chamber events.
Joanna Santana, a business and marketing educator at Quincy High School, was named Teacher of the Year for her investment in students and efforts to connect classroom learning with real-world opportunities.
Quincy Community Health Center received Business of the Year recognition for its healthcare services, accessibility efforts, community outreach and work with the Quincy Student Health and Wellness Center.
Yesenia James was posthumously honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award for more than a decade of work with local youth, including helping establish Quincy’s Special Olympics program.
The awards were presented during the Chamber’s Membership Appreciation Event last week, but the work being recognized reaches well beyond the Chamber itself.
An Appreciation Night Became Something More
The Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce gathered members last week at the Holiday Inn Express & Suites for its Membership Appreciation Event. The evening included food, flowers, music and an opportunity for the organization to thank the businesses and people who support its work.
But when the awards began, the focus widened beyond the event itself.
Volunteer of the Year, Teacher of the Year, Business of the Year and Lifetime Achievement Award each recognized a different kind of contribution to the Quincy Valley. Taken together, the recipients offered a snapshot of community service that is easy to overlook because much of it happens quietly and over long periods of time.
The Chamber solicited nominations ahead of the event, asking community members to explain not simply who should receive an award, but why. Those nominations provide a look at the work behind the recognition and, in several cases, work that has been taking place for years.
Marie Rylaarsdam: The Value of Showing Up
There are volunteer jobs that happen in front of a crowd, and there are others that consist mostly of being there when someone needs you. Marie Weinand Rylaarsdam’s recognition as Volunteer of the Year came largely from the second kind.
Rylaarsdam has volunteered with the Chamber for several years and regularly works its front desk on Wednesdays, greeting visitors, answering questions and helping keep the office operating. According to the Chamber’s recognition of her, she is also present at nearly every Chamber event, helping with setup and wherever else she is needed.
When asked what keeps bringing her back, according to the Chamber, Rylaarsdam’s answer is simple: she loves it, and she loves her community. Her award recognizes the kind of volunteer service built less around one major accomplishment than the decision to keep showing up, week after week and event after event.
Joanna Santana: A Quincy Student Comes Home to Teach
Teacher of the Year Joanna Santana teaches business and marketing at Quincy High School. Before she became a Quincy educator, however, Santana sat on the other side of the classroom as a Quincy student herself.
Her nomination describes an educator whose work extends beyond the traditional school calendar. Santana uses summer months to prepare and strengthen curriculum and develop learning experiences before students return to class. Her background in marketing, creativity and business allows her to connect classroom education with practical, real-world opportunities intended to build students’ confidence and prepare them for their futures.
Her nominator described Santana as intentional, innovative and deeply invested in student success. The nomination also specifically points to her decision to return to the community that helped shape her, describing it as an example of both the lasting impact of local education and the importance of giving back.
That makes Santana’s recognition more than the story of what happens inside her classroom today. Quincy invested in a student who eventually returned as an educator, and another generation of students is now learning from the experience she brought back with her.
Quincy Community Health Center: Removing Barriers to Care
The Business of the Year award went to Quincy Community Health Center, whose nomination focused both on the range of healthcare available locally and the organization’s efforts to make that care accessible.
The health center provides medical, dental, behavioral health, pharmacy, maternity support, WIC and same-day services, along with extended weekday and Saturday hours. Its nomination emphasized that cost, insurance status, language and cultural differences can become barriers between residents and healthcare. The center provides eligibility assistance, multilingual support and a sliding-fee discount program based on income and family size.
Its work also extends outside the clinic. Outreach staff and Promotoras de Salud connect residents with healthcare, education, resources and support throughout the community. The nomination specifically pointed to the Quincy Student Health and Wellness Center at Quincy High School, a partnership with the Quincy School District that gives students convenient access to medical and behavioral health services while reducing time away from class.
Together, those programs put the health center’s work in places throughout the 98848 where residents already live, work and attend school. The nomination presents accessibility not simply as having healthcare available in Quincy, but as helping residents overcome some of the practical obstacles that can keep them from using it.
Yesenia James: A Legacy Built Around Belonging
The final recognition of the evening carried a different weight.
Yesenia James died in February 2026, but the work that led to her Lifetime Achievement Award continues in the children, families and programs she helped along the way.
According to the nomination submitted by Cari Horning, James spent more than a decade giving her time to young people in the Quincy Valley. That included approximately a decade supporting and coaching youth soccer before she helped build Quincy’s Special Olympics program from the ground up.
Her family’s own experience helped shape that work. Inspired in part by her son and her family’s experience with Noonan syndrome, James understood personally the importance of inclusion, patience and opportunity for children with different needs. She and her husband, Joseph, helped establish a local Special Olympics team so children and families would not have to leave their own community to find a place where they could participate and belong.
Creating that opportunity required much more than deciding Quincy needed a team. The nomination describes fundraising, recruiting, organization, practices, travel and countless hours required to build a program from nothing. More important to James, according to Horning, was giving athletes the opportunity to discover what they could accomplish when someone was willing to teach them, encourage them and believe in them.
Horning described James as direct, strong, loving and deeply committed to doing what was right for children. She was also someone who had little patience when inequity meant a child was being overlooked. When James saw something missing in the community, the nomination says, she did not simply point it out. She worked to create it.
Her Lifetime Achievement Award recognized work whose impact did not end with her death. The local programs she helped establish, the athletes she encouraged and the families who found opportunities closer to home remain part of the community she served.
What This Means to You
For people who weren’t at the Chamber event, these awards could easily amount to four names in a Facebook post and a few photographs from an evening gathering. The nominations show why the recognition matters beyond the room where it was presented.
Residents encounter the results of this work in ordinary places throughout the community. It is there when someone walks into the Chamber office and finds a volunteer ready to help. It is in a Quincy High School classroom where students are being connected with practical business experience. It is at the health center and inside the high school wellness center when someone needs care. It is on the field and in the gym when a Special Olympics athlete has an opportunity to compete without having to leave the community to find it.
The four recipients are doing very different work, and their awards recognize very different accomplishments. What connects them is not a title or membership in one organization. It is the effect their work has had on people throughout Quincy and the surrounding 98848.
That is also why telling the stories behind community awards matters. The plaque records who received the recognition. The nomination explains what they did to earn it.
The Work Before the Recognition
The Chamber’s Membership Appreciation Event gave members an opportunity to gather and celebrate another year together. For a few minutes during that evening, it also put public attention on work that often happens without it.
Rylaarsdam’s recognition grew from years of Wednesdays and community events. Santana’s grew from the work of preparing students for opportunities beyond the classroom. Quincy Community Health Center’s reflected an effort to bring healthcare within reach of more local residents. James’ Lifetime Achievement Award recognized years spent creating opportunities for children and families, including a program that remains after her death.
Horning ended her nomination of James with a description of the example she believed James left behind: see the need, welcome everyone, do the work and always put the kids first.
Those words were written about Yesenia James, and her story remains uniquely her own. But last week’s awards offered four different examples of what can happen when someone sees a place where they can contribute and chooses to keep showing up.
That work does not always happen where the rest of us can see it. Last week, for one evening, four examples of it were brought into view; recognition for work throughout the 98848 that began long before their names were called.
