A message from the department chair

Cecelia Chesko left Bradley University with a degree and dreams for her future in 1942.  Her credentials she earned at Bradley allowed her to complete an internship and become a registered dietitian to direct food services for a school district in the Seattle Washington area for 14 years. Mrs.  Wheeler saw the world through the lenses partially provided by her Bradley education as she became a highly successful realtor and community advocate to empower women and children through her community service.  One of her passions was to help children, thus at the age when most of her friends were in retirement, CC spent at least 5 hours each week volunteering at a children's library.

The Family and Consumer Sciences Department is very serious about the stewardship of the gifts we receive from alumni and friends of this department.  This wonderful gift will allow us to enhance our commitment to provide tools for our students to engage in critical thinking skills and meet needs of the communities into which they go after graduation and to collaborate on research to improve practice within the field of Family and Consumer Sciences.  Receiving this gift is a very humbling experience as it speaks to the faith our alumnae have in this department to continue its mission of developing life-long skills for students in this human science profession. We are humbled and deeply grateful for the lasting legacy it provides for Cecelia Chesko Wheeler.

Cecelia Chesko Wheeler

Home Economics – 1942

Mrs. Wheeler passed away in October 2003 and generously left over $3.2 million to the university with the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences as the primary benefactor, the fourth-largest gift by an individual to Bradley and the largest ever to the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences and the College of Education and Health Sciences.

Only the interest from this gift will be used to support new initiatives within the Department.  It was Mrs. Wheeler's wish that her gift be used for the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences for the overall purpose of helping empower women.  There is no better way to do that than to honor and support professional achievement and development with a three-part initiative benefiting students, faculty and the profession of family and consumer sciences.   The donation will help establish an endowed professorship, a center of excellence for collaborative research and a scholarship in the department of family and consumer sciences.  The endowed professorship means that an additional graduate student will be added to the department in 2005-2006.  The Wheeler Center will be supported through an additional faculty member in 2006-2007.  This gift will enhance the future of Family and Consumer Sciences as one of the original department of Bradley as interest from the gift will be available each year to continue these initiatives.