The final piece of a puzzle fell into place this morning at the Portage la Prairie Chamber of Commerce office, as a $250.00 cheque was presented to Hayley Bedard in recognition of receiving the Young Woman of Excellence Award at the Women in Business Ungala in March.

Bedard's been working on a project for about three years to put 40 students in Kenya through primary school, as part of Free The Children. She explains the importance of the Ungala cheque.

"Before I found out I was receiving the award, I needed exactly $250.00 to reach the $2000 mark. So it was really a big surprise to find out that the award not only was a really great honour, but it also came with the exact amount of money I needed to reach my goal."

Bedard says it's a good feeling to finally have the money in place.

"Just finally getting that money sent to Free The Children, and hopefully get some sort of update, seeing just where exactly the money went, which area it went to, so I feel like now that I have the money it's becoming a lot more real, knowing what kind of impact it'll have."

The Ungala award was sponsored by the Portage la Prairie Credit Union.