GENEROSITY REPORT
Appraisal Nation and RCN Capital, partnering to support
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital By Erica LaCentra, RCN Capital
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he mission of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, a not-for-profit, section 501 (c)(3) corporation, is to advance cures, and means of prevention, for pediatric catastrophic diseases through research and treatment. Since its opening in 1962, St. Jude has spent more than half a century focusing on finding cures and saving children. Thanks to that mission, treatments at St. Jude have helped push the overall childhood cancer survival rate from less than 20% to 80% today. What is also incredible is Founder Danny Thomas’s vision for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital that no child should be denied treatment based on race, religion, or a family’s ability to pay. Because of this, the families of the over 8,500 patients the hospital treats a year never receive a bill from St. Jude for treatment, travel, housing or food. This ensures that families can focus on what is most important, their child. What St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has been able to accomplish and continues to accomplish is nothing short of amazing.
10 Originate Report | April 2019
So, when RCN Capital’s Managing Director, Jeffrey Tesch, learned that the company was scheduled to attend a Single-Family Rental Summit in Memphis, TN, he knew immediately that he wanted to make the trip that much more memorable by visiting and donating to the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital while in the area. When he realized that Appraisal Nation would be attending the same conference, he reached out to his long-standing friend and CEO of Appraisal Nation, Michael Tedesco, to see if the company would also like to get involved. Mike jumped at the opportunity to contribute to the organization. “It is incredible what St. Jude has built. They really have thought of everything to make the lives of the children affected by cancer as well as their family’s lives better while they are going through something so unimaginably hard,” said Mike Tedesco, CEO of Appraisal Nation. “I am proud to be part of a company and part of a partnership that wants to help and give back to such an amazing charity as St. Jude.”
On March 10th, employees from both Appraisal Nation and RCN Capital came together to take a guided tour of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Learning more about the history of the organization, what they have been able to accomplish, and continue to do for patients and their families and seeing the staff that make so much of it possible was an inspiring experience. “The opportunity to tour St. Jude while in Memphis was a very emotional but uplifting experience,” said Erica LaCentra, RCN Capital’s Director of Marketing. “It was incredible to hear about all that they do at the facility but what made it even more amazing was to hear all of this from our tour guide, who was a former patient that is alive today because of the treatment he received at St. Jude. It really reinforced the immense impact this organization has had on their mission of ending childhood cancer”. One of the facts that came to light during the tour was that all of the treatment that occurs at St. Jude comes
