ST. LOUIS — St. Louis University High School closed out the centennial celebration of its Oakland Avenue campus with the announcement Saturday of a $16 million donation — the largest in the history of the all-boys school, the oldest high school west of the Mississippi River.
The money, given by a 1970 graduate, has been earmarked to support faculty training, research and curriculum development, among other initiatives.
John Schaefer, 73, and his wife, Pamela Zilly, began speaking with SLUH leaders last fall about how to make the most impact on the school, which was founded in 1818.
“It’s investing in teaching and academic excellence,” said Schaefer, who grew up in Jennings and now lives in New York. “What you remember about high school is the teachers.”
The idea for the Sciuto Institute for Teaching Excellence grew from there, he said.
SITE, as it will be called, is named after Schaefer’s classmate, Matt Sciuto, who retired from SLUH in 2019 after a nearly four-decade career teaching theology and coaching baseball and football.
SLUH, a private Catholic institution, has more than 90 full-time faculty members and about a thousand students. Tuition tops $24,000 a year, with half of the students receiving financial assistance.
The endowed SITE program will not raise teacher pay or be used to hire more teachers, said Alan Carruthers, SLUH’s president.
“It will allow us to support teachers and be nimble as our world changes,” he said in an interview. “We will be able to get the best and keep the best teachers.”
Schaefer, who attended the University of Notre Dame for his undergraduate degree, earned a master’s in business administration at Harvard. He worked in financial services and retired from Morgan Stanley.
Although he hasn’t lived in the St. Louis area since he left for college, he stays connected to his former classmates through regular newsletters and reunions. He credits the enduring friendships in part to Sciuto, their senior-class president who “bleeds blue” — the color of the Junior Billikens.
Schaefer and Carruthers broke the news to Sciuto on Friday afternoon, a day before the official announcement was made.
“It took us a whole hour to convince him it was a good idea” for him to be the namesake, said Schaefer. “He’s the most humble guy you’ll ever meet.”
The $16 million donation for SITE comes a year after the school received another hefty gift: $10 million to expand instruction in science, technology, engineering and math.
Class of 1965 alumnus Bob Conrads and his wife, Sherry, announced the Conrads Scholars Program at a gala last September. In its first year, 53 students have enrolled in a STEM-themed curricular strand.
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Colleen Schrappen | Post-Dispatch
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