Family Turns Grief Into Lasting Gift for Future Teachers

A Missouri family transformed their heartbreak into hope by creating a scholarship that will help future teachers for generations to come.

Three Rivers College in Poplar Bluff announced the Ava Grace Memorial Scholarship, funded by the family of Ava Grace Felps, who died in 2025 at age 8. Her grandmother Malissa Timbush and parents Michele and Brandon Felps turned their grief into action, establishing a permanent endowment to support students pursuing degrees in early childhood development.

The scholarship will award its first funds in fall 2026. Because it's structured as an endowment, the money will continue helping students forever, with the family planning to raise additional funds to increase award amounts over time.

Michele Felps remembers her daughter as a light who "danced through life with a softball in hand, chasing butterflies beneath sunny skies, singing songs from the depths of her joyful heart, and filling every room with laughter and light."

Why This Inspires

Ava Grace lived only eight years, but her family found a way to extend her impact far beyond her time on earth. Every student who receives this scholarship will carry forward the joy and light she brought to the world.

The scholarship specifically supports early childhood development students, the very people who shape young lives like Ava Grace's. It's a beautiful circle of care that honors a child by helping those who will nurture the next generation.

Michelle Reynolds, director of development at Three Rivers College, called it "a gift that keeps on giving." Three Rivers students already receive more than $14 million in financial aid annually, and now Ava Grace's legacy will be woven into that support system permanently.

The family's choice to fund education shows remarkable strength. Instead of letting grief be the final word, they're writing a new story where Ava Grace's memory opens doors and creates opportunities year after year.

One young life will now touch countless others through the educators this scholarship helps train.