Mr. Dave Thomas, SJ Endowment

"JUG Master" and Honorary Alumnus

For Mr. Dave Thomas, S.J. Seattle Prep was his heart. Prep was his home for over 35 years. He devoted his life to teaching and mentoring generations of Seattle Prep students. Dave was a beloved history teacher. He also served as the “Jug” master and supervised the work study students. At the core of Dave’s belief was that a Prep education should be accessible to a diverse group of young men and women regardless of ability to pay. Today, we want to honor his legacy in perpetuity by establishing an endowment to support tuition assistance for generations to come.

At the 2010 Panther Reunion, Dave received the Distinguished Alumnus Award, honoring him for the tremendous impact that he had on so many at Seattle Prep. His firm, yet caring teaching still resonates amongst our alumni today. As Brian DuJulio ’79 so eloquently stated at the award ceremony,

“We all remember that in our high school years, we were fragile clumps of clay, sometimes wobbling off the potter’s spinning wheel. We’d make mistakes, we’d get off track, and sometimes needed a gentle, but firm push back in the right direction…no one understood this more than Dave Thomas."

Central to Seattle Prep’s mission is the belief that qualified students should be able to experience the richness, vitality and transformational nature of a Jesuit education. The Prep community – our families, alumni, faculty and staff and friends – feel passionately that no student should be deprived of this opportunity because of the inability to pay full tuition.

Over the past several years, Prep has seen a dramatic increase in the demand for tuition assistance. Despite the increase in the allocation of funds from the operating budget for tuition assistance, Prep is still not able to meet the need of its prospective students. The only way that Prep will be able to remain accessible to a diverse socio-economic community is to increase our endowment.

Mr. Dave Thomas, S.J. gave his heart to Prep; we now honor his legacy by establishing the Mr. Dave Thomas, S.J. Endowment.