University Communications

When People dig into their pockets to give to UCLA, it is about much more than the money. They are making a statement about what they believe is important.

By Judy Lin-Eftekhar
Photography by Amanda Friedman,
(Johnson) Thomas Del Brase

One is a retired college professor who wants everyone to remember the mentor who encouraged him on his successful career path. Another is a cancer survivor whose dream is to help others like her to triumph over the disease. There are mothers and fathers and alumni and friends and relatives, all of them doing what they can to help make a difference in the lives of students and the life of a university.

The reasons that people give are as diverse as the thousands of donors who decide to become active participants in building the future of UCLA. What motivates them to contribute? We asked several of them, and here's what they told us.

APRIL MOELL:
CELEBRATING SURVIVAL

"You just don't forget the day you were diagnosed," says April Moell. "I remember every word. I remember the faces. I remember the whole feel of it."

She was in her 30s, working as an occupational therapist at St. Jude Medical Center in Fullerton, Calif., where she and her husband, Joe, still live. She'd been feeling tired — exhausted, really — for months, and developing one infection after another. After a round of doctor visits, she ended up in the offices of a local oncologist who performed an examination of her bone marrow.

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