Schreibers donate $25 million to Lurie Children’s Hospital to support early childhood programs

Local couple Kathleen and John Schreiber are donating $25 million to Lurie Children’s Hospital to create a center to focus on the health and wellness of children from birth through age 5.

The program will be named the Schreiber Family Center for Early Childhood Health and Wellness, and will bring together Lurie experts and community organizations to support children and families. It will be part of Lurie’s Patrick M. Magoon Institute for Healthy Communities, which focuses on community-based initiatives.

It will support programs that connect expecting parents with doulas and home visits. It will also work with programs meant to help build children’s resiliency and social-emotional well-being, and work to improve training for early childhood workers. The center’s work is expected to benefit children throughout the Chicago area, with a focus on the city’s West Side.

The money will also be used for research on ways to help newborns and very young children who face inequities.

“Providing high-quality medical care and cutting-edge research is essential, but it is not enough to meet the critical needs of our youth,” said Dr. Thomas Shanley, Lurie Children’s president and CEO. “We need to focus on the upstream factors that lead to health and racial inequities our children and communities experience. The Schreiber family’s visionary gift will support us in this work.”

Schreiber grew up in Chicago and attended Loyola University, before heading to Harvard University’s business school. He then spent 20 years in real estate investment management and founded the New York-based Blackstone Group’s real estate investment management business.