Here’s the Guy You Want on Your Team

When Jim Schott was asked to chair the Foundation's VISIONWALK last May in Orlando, he said, "I just have to do this," even though he knew there would be challenges.

Not only was this the Foundation's first-ever VISIONWALK anywhere in the country, Schott had only a few months to organize and mobilize a local team to launch the event and try to meet a fundraising goal of $50,000.

Schott went into action. He wrote letters and editorials to local newspapers. He found a local celebrity, Lee Corso of ESPN College Game Day, to attend and publicize the event. He and his wife, Ginny, sent out 180 letters to friends and family, asking them to support the walk and critical retinal disease research. About 70 percent of the recipients replied with a contribution.

More than 500 people attended the inaugural VISIONWALK in Orlando, and the event raised $103,000.

After you spend a few minutes talking to Schott, the 67-year-old former Superintendent of Orange County Schools in Florida, you can't help but notice his strong conviction to make meaningful things happen. And he had a personal reason to get involved in the Foundation's cause - his 40-year-old daughter, Cathy, a divorced mother with two young children, is affected by Usher syndrome. She's had substantial hearing loss since she was a child, and began losing vision in college.

Schott gets quite animated when he talks about the prospects for treatments and cures that can help his daughter. "When someone says these diseases are incurable, I get angry, because they aren't incurable. There is a cure. We just haven't found it yet. We have to have money to make people aware and fund the necessary research."

And though Schott is motivated to overcome his daughter's relatively rare condition, he is quick to point out that retinal degenerative diseases can affect anyone. He says, "There are many people walking around today just like me in their 50s and 60s. They don't know that they're going to end up with macular degeneration. You are helping yourself when you are helping the Foundation."

What's perhaps most remarkable about Schott's success in leading the VISIONWALK effort is that he's involved in so many other community- and education-oriented projects. Schott is not only a fulltime Assistant Professor at National-Lewis University, he's also a Senior Consultant for an educational organization called Promoting Regional Improvement in Science and Math (PRISM), and he's active in the development of a new Junior Achievement Leadership and Entrepreneurship Academy. He talks glowingly of a local nonprofit called the Community Service Center, where he volunteers in helping people meet short term financial and logistical needs after an illness or personal crisis.

How does he do it all? "I have a very understanding wife," he says with a chuckle.

But Schott does find time to stay close to his family, especially his wife, two daughters, and their children. His other daughter, Susi, and her husband are all very supportive of his work and Cathy. Schott proudly says, "Cathy does a remarkable job. Her kids are so good to her. They take her hand and help her when it's night or they are in a dark place. They are very sensitive and loving - her guardian angels."

Schott considers Cathy and all people who are affected by vision-robbing retinal diseases to be heroes. "I'm amazed when I think about Cathy and what she has to go through, and in really heroic ways... she's not alone. Sight-impaired people all have incredible fears, yet they get up everyday and battle through it. They are courageous and in need of our help. We are their hope, their path to sight...failing them is unacceptable."