Coming from a fairly large family back home in Schoolcraft, Elizabeth Carpenter knew when she left high school that the responsibility of paying for her education would fall on her shoulders.

In that light, her decision to attend Southwestern Michigan College has paid off tremendously, as she has won several scholarships for her musical and scholastic achievements.

“I can say right now that I’m going to college and I’m not taking out a single loan, on my own,” she said, tears beginning to well in her eyes.

Carpenter was one of several current and former SMC students who shared how the community college changed their lives during the President’s Reception Dinner, which took place Saturday evening during the school’s 50th anniversary celebration. More than 50 people from around the Michiana region were in attendance. Four former SMC presidents were there, including the college’s first president, Nathan Ivey.

Current president David Mathews delivered the opening remarks at the ceremony. Despite admitting his difficultly in looking back rather than forward, Mathews reflected on the importance the school has had in his own life, being the son of one of the school’s founding board members.

“Southwestern Michigan College and its element of success has been a part of my life since my earliest memories,” Mathews said.

In the years that followed since the college’s groundbreaking, which a 5-year-old Mathews happened to witness, the school has grown tremendously into the success story it is today. However, even while evolving to meet the changing needs of the area’s students, the school’s core principal of personalized instruction remains the same as they have ever been.

“That was always at the heart of SMC,” Mathews said. “We’ve had marketing slogans that say ‘excellence with a personal touch.’ That captures it better than anything else.”

Cassopolis’ Ashley Soloway attested to this fact. A recent alumna of the college’s school of nursing, Soloway said that her instructors’ investment in her future helped her endure the difficultly of her courses.

“In nursing school, you know that if you woke up and it was light out, you were late for class,” Soloway said. “There were one or two times where my instructor was texting me, since she knew I was always early, if I wasn’t there. She would ask ‘Are you ok? Are you coming?’”

With state funding to community colleges in decline, there are several issues the school has still to overcome in the next 50 years. Despite that, the president said that with the community’s continued support, leaders are looking ahead to the future.

“We are just getting started,” Mathews said. “And as matter of course, the work we have now is different but still incredibly challenging. We have students coming from us from difficult family situations or difficult family situations. And we have to be there for them.”