Family Endowments Aid San Diego Academy Students

By Will James

Two wonderful women recently left generous legacies to the Paradise Valley church in their wills.

Bernice Sheidler, widow of the late George Sheidler, who for many years owned and operated George's Wonderful World of Cakes in National City, left a gift of $35,000 to establish an endowment at Southeastern California Conference for Christian education at San Diego Academy for students from the Paradise Valley church.

Bernice Sheidler

Image of Bernice SheidlerBernice was a volunteer at the Paradise Valley Hospital for many years and a loyal supporter of the Paradise Valley church and Community Services. She faithfully attended the church's rummage sales to see what she could buy to support the Community Services. Even when she was too weak to attend herself, she asked others to go and tell her what was there so she could buy something.

Bernice passed away during one of the rummage sales. Her daughters donated several truckloads of items she had collected over the years to be sold at the next rummage sale. At that sale Community Services raised a record of more than $12,000, a large percentage of which was from Bernice's estate.

Dr. Pedro & Ramona Villanueva

Ramona Villanueva, widow of the late Dr. Pedro Villanueva, left the Paradise Valley church $55,000 in her will to be used as endowment moneys for Christian education. Through the years the Villanueva family helped many children to attend San Diego Academy.

Image of Dr. Pedro & Ramona VillanuevaDr. Pedro and Ramona VillanuevaThe legacy of these two families will live until the Lord comes as these funds generate scholarship funds for students at San Diego Academy every year.

In 1995 Southeastern California Conference established the SECC Education Endowment for all of the schools and child development centers in the conference. The funds are professionally managed and overseen by the SECC Investment Committee. Each school and center may have their own subfund. In order to stimulate giving to this endowment fund, the conference has been matching gifts given each year. The circumstances during the year these gifts were made, 2008, allowed SECC to provide a dollar-for-dollar match, thus doubling the principal to $180,000.

The goal of Paradise Valley church members is to establish a $1 million endowment for student aid at San Diego Academy, thereby guaranteeing that every student who wants a Christian education can be assured of one. Members are giving more than $3,500 a month in student aid at San Diego Academy and looking for ways to do more.