Spirit of Giving: Brunette Endowment

Janie Brunette is grateful for the Catholic education she received at St. James the Greater Catholic School. Her parents, who were one of the founding families at St. James, believed in the Catholic way of life and Catholic education. Janie, who made her career in hospital administration and as a clinical nurse specialist, attributes the professional success of herself and her six siblings to the sacrifice their parents made in sending them to St. James and Mount Saint Mary High School. In honor of their parents, Janie and her sister Cindy started the Mildred and Clair Brunette Family Memorial Endowment in 2015 to help supply the school with books and other learning materials.

The endowment is managed by the Catholic Foundation of Oklahoma and makes an annual distribution of about $600 to St. James. For the 2020-21 school year, this money was used to help with badly needed computer upgrades. Alicia Vazquez, who is the principal at St. James, is grateful for the annual contributions, and is hoping to use them for computer programs to keep up with online learning for students. Alicia decided to show the students how the gifts from the Brunette Endowment impact the school by using a special stamp to put the family name on books purchased from the distributions.