How does a family deal with the loss of a loved one? In 2007, Mike and Suzanna tragically lost their 15-year-old son, Alex. In an effort to manage their grief and honour their son’s memory, Alex’s parents and brother decided to set up a memorial fund at The Kitchener and Waterloo Community Foundation (KWCF).
“Helping others, particularly youth, is one way we cope with losing Alex,” his mother Suzanna has shared with me.
“Establishing the Alex Schmidt Memorial Fund at The KWCF gave us the opportunity to set a focus for collecting donations in his name. Doing so allowed us the extra time and flexibility we needed to decide how best to use the funds to honour Alex.”
When a loved one dies, keeping their memory alive is a way of honouring their life and coping with the loss. By creating a charitable endowment fund, you have the opportunity to remember your loved one and benefit the community forever.
You benefit from the expertise of experienced local program staff, community leadership and investment management.
Your gift is invested over time. Earnings are used to make grants addressing community needs. Your gift — and all future earnings from your gift — is a permanent source of community capital, helping do good work today and in the future.
Each year Suzanna and her family host a fun Run/Walk event as a way to celebrate Alex’s life. Proceeds from the Run/Walk are used to build the fund and also support the Pathways to Education program at Mosaic Counselling and Family Services — an innovative initiative the family first learned about at an event held by The KWCF.
Pathways reaches out to teens from at-risk or economically disadvantaged communities and encourages them to stay in school, graduate and move on to post-secondary education. The program has already seen tremendous success in Toronto’s Regent Park area.
For the fourth year in a row, family and friends will come together to remember Alex at the Alex Schmidt Memorial Fun 5 Km Run/Walk.
This year’s run will be held Oct. 1 at RIM Park with registration starting at 9 a.m. and the Run/Walk at 10 a.m.
The event is a “fantastic way” to learn about the Pathways program, “an initiative that is building a ‘graduation nation’ in K-W,” points out Jean Davies, program director for Pathways to Education.
In addition to financial support, Suzanna is now also volunteering as a Pathways to Education tutor.
She shares that there will “always be a hole in my heart because of losing Alex, but I have found that opening my heart to others makes that hole seem a little smaller. The KWCF has helped me to help others in my community.”
To learn more about The KWCF, the Alex Schmidt Memorial Fund, or establishing an endowment in memory of a loved one, please visit www.kwcf.ca or call (519) 725-1806.
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Guest columnist Rosemary Smith is the CEO of The Kitchener and Waterloo Community Foundation.
