The mission of the Tiger Woods Foundation in Irvine is as lofty as its namesake’s towering drives off the tee.
The foundation works through its Earl Woods Scholarship program and Tiger Woods Learning centers with a goal of helping thousands of underserved students in Orange County and elsewhere realize their dreams of college and beyond.
Nearly all of the students are the first members in their extended families to attend college. Many would otherwise lack the financial resources and guidance to flourish there.
The foundation aims to fill those gaps.
“It’s all about the kids,” said Peter Ueberroth, a perennial member of the OC 50 and part of the foundation’s board since 2004 (see Ueberroth’s profile in the OC 50 Special Report, starting on page 21). “Let’s continue to impact a lot of young people in a positive way.”
Ueberroth, top executive of Newport Beach-based investment firm The Contrarian Group, is on a committee that oversees the foundation’s investments and asset allocations. He first championed youth causes after the Los Angeles riots in 1992, leading a group of local executives in an effort to rebuild damaged businesses and neighborhoods in the city.
Michael McKee, then the No. 2 executive at Newport Beach-based Irvine Company, asked him to join the foundation’s board in 2004. It didn’t take long for Ueberroth to accept—he had played golf with Woods and was struck by his gratitude and charitable work.
Pebble Beach
Ueberroth brought his own tie to golf. He led an investment group that purchased the famed shoreline golf course at Pebble Beach. One year he was paired in a group with Woods, then a rising star on the tour, for the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am in 2000. He later had a greenside view of Woods’ historic comeback from seven strokes down with seven holes to play.
The win was Cypress-born Woods’ sixth straight on the tour, a run that likely won’t be matched.
Woods’ game has slipped due to injuries and his well-documented personal affairs in recent years. He seems to be getting his swing back lately.
Ueberroth said Woods should get more credit for the foundation’s achievements and its role in Orange County, where as a youngster the golfer learned to swing, chip and putt.
“It’s amazing what he does under the radar screen,” said Ueberroth, who also organized the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles and later served as commissioner of Major League Baseball.
“Tiger Woods is making an enormous impact in the county. I don’t know who else is doing quite as much.”
Ueberroth is among a cadre of high-profile members from OC on the foundation board. Others include fellow OC 50er and University of California, Irvine, Chancellor Michael Drake (see profile in Special Report, starting on page 21).
“His expertise in education goes without saying,” foundation Chief Executive and President Greg McLaughlin said of Drake. “He’s been great providing a lot of leadership and council.”
Other board members include McKee, a former OC 50 member and current chief executive of Seattle-based real estate investment advisory Bentall Kennedy U.S.; Raj Batal, who made millions in swimwear and the sale of his Raj Manufacturing in Tustin; financial services heavyweight Dale Dykema; and Marion Bergeson, a former county supervisor, state legislator and California secretary of education.
Dykema, founder and chief executive of Santa Ana-based T.D. Service Financial Corp., and golf fanatic Donald Kennedy, the late chairman emeritus of First American Corp., were founding members of the foundation’s nominating committee and a driving force in its early days.
“Those two identified and recruited the balance of the founding board,” McLaughlin said. “They were instrumental in interesting the Orange County community.”
So was Todd Theodora, who has chaired the Earl Woods Scholarship program since its inception, and Sandra Barry, a former superintendent of the Anaheim school district who helped craft the curriculum.
“I got involved with the Tiger Woods Learning Center before there was a center,” Barry said. “We think it’s the best-kept secret in Orange County.”
The 35,000-square-foot center in Anaheim—near Western High School, which Woods attended—gives kids a safe-haven from gangs and drugs, and encourages them to stay in school and advance their education.
70 This Year
This year 70 students are in the scholarship program. They’ll receive mentoring, financial assistance and other support services while attending some of the most prestigious universities in the country and state.
“I have not seen another scholarship program that provides this type of investment,” said Theodora, a senior attorney at the Costa Mesa office of Theodora Oringher PC.
Theodora has mentored Anaheim native Omar Villa since he enrolled at University of California, Santa Cruz, as a wide-eyed freshman. Villa contemplated dropping out and going home to be closer to friends but stuck it out.
Now he’s weighing scholarships offers from some of the top graduate schools in the nation after earning his degree, and might follow Theodora’s footsteps to law school one day.
