Arkansas Dream Center Comes to Texas

Photo by: Maura Cueva

Seniors, Lauren Shackelford, Juliana Roller,Mason Lee, Trey Faulkner, Kade Stephens, and Dylan King pause a basketball game to take a picture with kids from the Dream Center.

Maura Cueva, staff writer

Photo by: Maura Cueva
Seniors, Emma Thompson and Natalia Tubiolo pose for a picture with two kids from the Dream Center.
Photo by: Maura Cueva
Junior, Lauren Rose plays basketball with the Dream Center kids.
Photo by: Maura Cueva
Juniors, Allie Smith and Allie LeBlanc do stunts with the kids for the dance competition.

The Arkansas Dream Center is an organization that was developed to love, serve, and build relationships as an outreach program in Little Rock, Arkansas. Children from around the city go to the Dream Center as an afterschool program to do homework, have fun, and be shown love and joy before they go home. During the week of March 4-8, a group of MCA students traveled to the Dream Center for Missions Week. The week of March 17, a select group of 4th and 5th graders from the Dream Center came to MCA for their spring break. The children went to church Sunday morning and then settled at MCA. Once they arrived, they settled in, went to the Reunion Tower, then came back to the school. The boys slept in the “dungeon” and the girls slept on the stage in the SLC. On Monday morning they went to the Dallas Aquarium. Ireall, one of the children from the Dream Center, said, “Going to the aquarium was really fun and I enjoyed seeing the flamingos and sharks.” On Monday night the Dream Center went to the Mavericks game and the kids were gifted with Mavs hats. On Tuesday the Dream Center took a tour of the AT&T stadium, came back to MCA for lunch, then went to an indoor waterpark. Tuesday night was the night the kids (and many MCA students) were most excited for, it was Game Night. MCA students came to play games such as basketball, soccer, volleyball, and dance. There were two dance teams who had 30 minutes to choreograph a dance and then compete in front of everyone. Kristian from the Dream Center said, “Game night was by far her favorite day because there was leadership and she enjoyed seeing all the MCA students again.” On Wednesday the Dream Center kids ate breakfast at the school, went to the escape room in McKinney, and then headed back to Arkansas. Many of the kids were very saddened to leave and go back to Arkansas; however, they were happy they had the opportunity to come to MCA and do activities outside of their everyday routine in Arkansas.