Giving Back

Cheri and Gary Swoboda are parents of Ryan '99 and Tim '02. A few months ago they dropped in to see Msgr. Murphy and wrote the school a check large enough to almost pay a student's full tuition. We asked Cheri what compelled them to make such a generous gift these 15 years later.

Why this donation now?

"We got almost to the end - Tim's senior year - and we had some issues come up. At this point, we didn't want to take him out. I went to Fr. Murphy and said, "I don't know what I'm going to do," and he said, "Don't worry about it. Your son is going to stay here and you don't have to worry about it." Thankfully we received the financial aid we needed.

My husband and I both believe that if someone does something for you, you should try to give something back. We kept saying all these years we wanted to pay it back. We also felt that because someone was nice enough to help us, we should try to give more than what we had received. Obviously, tuition is a lot more now than what it was at that time.

If you feel like you can help one child, one student, and it makes a difference, that's all that matters."