Lake Orion – The Happy Dragon Project,

Our first meeting with Superintendent Heidi Mercer and her team was warm and encouraging. It quickly became clear that we all share a commitment to strengthening the Dragon community, and this partnership provides a meaningful platform to do just that.

Over several months of collaboration, we developed candidate criteria, created the project name and logo, assigned responsibilities, and — importantly — found a local orthodontist with strong ties to Lake Orion who shares our vision: DeHaan Orthodontics. After much nurturing and teamwork, The Happy Dragon Project is ready to launch this fall.

The above represents just a fraction of the work that has gone into building this platform. Moving forward, the project’s success depends heavily on community involvement. Each individual case supported by the program has an estimated cost of $5,100, and because our funding relies entirely on donations, fostering and deepening community relationships is essential.

We are grateful to have received a generous $5,000 donation from Meijer Independence Market to kickstart this effort. In the coming months, we will be reaching out to the Lake Orion community to join us in supporting this important cause.

We view The Happy Dragon Project as a model we hope to expand into surrounding school districts, so we can support even more children and youth across nearby communities.