While the Masters golf tournament was in its opening round Thursday, another golf tournament with a Masters theme was taking place in north Phoenix at the Sagewood senior living community.
The Sagewood Residents Foundation held its second annual Putt Fore Scholarships fundraising tournament on an 18-hole putting course at the facility, the greens in pristine condition and dozens of men and women who call Sagewood home taking part.
Proceeds from the tournament, which was residents-only in the morning and expanded to include guests after a lunch, go to Sagewood staff members and children of staff members to help pay for the costs of furthering their own of their sons’ or daughters’ education.
Organizer Barbra O’Brien, a former professional golfer, tied in the Masters to her event. Lunch on Thursday included foods found at Augusta National Golf Club, such as the famous pimento cheese sandwich.
“We have a set fee. And anything extra that they (residents) want to contribute is wonderful. And we’ve had a number of people do that,” O’Brien said. “We just don’t want any pressure put on them.”
Inside the sprawling facility located steps away from the Musical Instrument Museum and not far from TPC Scottsdale and the WM Phoenix Open hangs a framed photo of all 44 recipients of a foundation scholarship for this year. Many work in food service and other day-to-day departments of the facility, and some come from immigrant families that may not be able to fully pay for a college education.
Residents pay a registration fee to enter the golf tournament, and the funds go directly to scholarships. A staff member or parent of a college-bound dependent who works at Sagewood is required to be at least a part-time employee to be eligible, and the money raised pays an estimated 90 percent of community college tuition cost and 80 percent of four-year university tuition, said Dr. Marlene Ross, former president of the Sagewood Residents Society.
Sagewood residents have raised more than $1.3 million and awarded more than 450 scholarships in the 10 years of doing so, Ross said.
Some recipients have worked at Sagewood for years, starting as teenagers, then going to college and continuing to work. They are told of the scholarship opportunity when hired, and it becomes a way to keep employees, who over time build close relationships with the residents.
“We see them every single day in one of the restaurants, there are five restaurants here. And so we see them,” Ross said. “And they’re always very grateful for the scholarship. Most of those families are first generation (in the U.S.).”
Mahdis Moghtaderi, born in Iran, and Mirna Georgees, born in Iraq, are two longtime employees and scholarship recipients who work in food service at Sagewood and attend college classes.
Moghtaderi got her bachelor’s degree at Grand Canyon in advertising and graphic design, then decided she wanted to help people and plans to go back in school for dental hygiene at Phoenix College. Georgees is in school studying paramedicine, and her goal is to work with the fire department and become an aeromedic, or an EMT who does her work in helicopters.
“It’s truly an honor for me to be one of the scholarship recipients. The Sagewood Residents Foundation has been really a huge help for me, not just financially, but also the support that we get from the residents is just amazing, and just keeps us going,” Moghtaderi said.
“I would probably have been taking like one class a semester if I didn’t have this opportunity,” Georgees said.
Sagewood executive director Ed Smith said it was the residents who took it upon themselves to create a scholarship fund for employees.
“The majority of our residents, if not all of them, value education, and recognize that it’s an opportunity to help not only support the staff of Sagewood, but also to help develop education,” Smith said. “We value the educational component, we value the relationship that it builds between the residents and our staff.”
Smith oversees 750 residents and 400 staff members at Sagewood. He said there is a formal process of awarding scholarships that includes an application, meeting eligibility requirements and an interview.
Scholarship recipients are honored when they graduate.
“Knowing that the residents are so invested in the scholarship program to support our staff, it makes me as a leader, absolutely more dedicated to my job,” Smith said. “It’s just a unique program that really is a benefit for the residents, because it does help us maintain consistent staffing and also helps us invest in the future of our staff.”
