Photograph by Skye Dunlap
Colin Jung sits with his daughters Christina, 8, and Alesia, 10, on the kindergarten playground at Nimitz elementary school. Christina and Alesia also attend Nimitz.
Jung uses legacy for learning
Fund to benefit Nimitz Elementary
By Jeff Kearns
Henry Chew, an Oakland man who passed away more than a year ago at age 92, never visited Nimitz Elementary School in Sunnyvale. But, last week, he gave almost $250,000 to establish an endowment for Nimitz students.
Colin Jung, a family friend of Chew and executor of his will, directed the donation to Nimitz, where Jung's two daughters attend classes.
The Cupertino Educational Endowment Fund will use the donation to establish an endowment. Officials expect the endowment will yield between $10,000 and $12,000 per year. Administrators will use the money to buy educational materials and classroom supplies.
Additionally, executors set aside $10,000 for the Nimitz Parent-Teacher Association to use for the $8,000 owed on new playground equipment recently installed for kindergartners.
May Jung, this year's PTA president, says the remaining $2,000 will be carried over for use by next year's PTA, possibly for school assemblies. Jung works as a pediatric nurse at Lucille Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford University. She says kids were foremost on her mind when it came time to pick an organization to receive the money from the estate.
"We wanted to do something with kids and something that could be perpetuated, but also something that benefited the greatest amount of kids for the longest time," she said. "I'm really excited to see what we can do with the money in the years to come."
Jung's daughter Alesia is in fifth grade at the school, and Christina is in third grade.
Colin Jung, who grew up in Sunnyvale and works as a planner for the city of Cupertino, said Chew was a friend of his parents. In his will, Chew left half of his money to the family of his wife, who died before him, and the other half to his brother in Taiwan, who, it turned out, also passed away about five years ago.
In this case, Chew's will stipulated the money should go to charity. As executors, Colin and May Jung decided they'd like to see the money go to education.
While the bulk of the money is going to Nimitz, Jung also made donations to charitable alumni organizations at his alma maters, UC Berkeley, where he studied ecology as an undergraduate, and San Jose State, where he went to graduate school.
Jung also donated some of the money to OASES (Oakland Asian Students Educational Services), a non-profit community group of college students, who volunteer to tutor disadvantaged Asian youths in Oakland.
Jung said he didn't have to look far to find a suitable place for the funds. "We were very dismayed by some of the requests that we'd get from some of our kids' teachers, for things like reading materials, tissues, antibacterial soap ... they don't have a budget for these things they'd be asking parents. I grew up in the Santa Clara Valley, and I don't remember teachers asking for this stuff.
"With all this wealth creation here in the valley, it's unfortunate you see teachers in the schools going begging," Jung added. "As important as education seems to be in this valley, I'm really surprised that there aren't more donations being made to schools here."
The Jungs went to Nimitz principal Danni Tsai and asked her, "If you had a big pot of money you weren't expecting, what would you spend it on?"
After Tsai went to the teachers and drew up a list of possible uses, Jung said, "We were surprised to find out that almost everything on that list could be paid for with just the earnings on that money."
Tsai will work with the school's PTA to work out the details of how the money will be divided between all the classrooms.
The money, which was delivered to CEEF last week, will be put in a separate fund earning about 6 percent interest a year, said executive director Eleanor Watanabe.
Watanabe said the donation was the first time anyone has ever made one to CEEF that is intended for just one of the 24 schools in the Cupertino Union School District. It will be called the Henry Y. Chew Family Legacy Fund.
"What better legacy than to be able to make this donation to hundreds or thousands of children?" Watanabe said. "It's an important vehicle for making a long-term impact in children's lives. With this gift there will be benefits for generations to come."
Watanabe added that people may make additional donations to the Chew fund: "Hopefully, people will see the benefit of this and choose to make additional contributions."
Jung said he, too, hoped the donation would spur others to open their checkbooks for local schools. "As busy as we are around here, parents really need to get involved in their kids' schools and find out what their needs are," he said. "There's a lot of money around here, and we should really think about including local schools in our charitable giving, because it really would make a difference. You can't imagine the feeling you get from being able to give like that--it's a very fulfilling feeling."
Jung said Chew was a friend of his parents and worked as a machinist in Oakland. Together, he and his wife amassed a small fortune before they died by saving every penny.
"Let me tell you, he was frugal," Jung said.
Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
