Education a family affair
 |
| Susan Vitali-Lovell and her father, Jack Vitali, are pictured together during Easter 2008, the year they both succumbed to cancer. |
For the large tight-knit family of the late John (Jack) Vitali, Western and education are family affairs.
An electrical engineer by education, Jack moved to London in 1975, where he became the highly successful owner of Highbury Ford. Over the years, he and his large family developed a strong connection to Western -- located just a few short blocks from their home.
Though not a Western grad himself, Jack’s wife Frances is. She went back to school while raising their six children, earning her Western degree in 1991. Four of their children went on to earn Western degrees of their own, and nine of their 17 grandchildren (so far) have also joined the ranks of the “purple and proud.”
Frances says education was a life-long pursuit for Jack. As he was nearing retirement, she remembers him auditing engineering and mathematics classes on campus together with some of his grandchildren.
“One year he wanted to teach his grandchildren about computers,” recalls Frances, “so he set up a classroom in our garage. During the first month they built their own computer, and in the second month they learned how to use it.”
In 2008, tragedy struck twice in the Vitali family. Their eldest daughter, Susan Vitali Lovell, died of cancer, only to be followed a few short months later by Jack, who also succumbed to cancer.
Frances describes her late daughter as a very giving person who was a lot of fun to be around and always told the best jokes. Susan attended university in Toronto to become a pharmacist, before the family moved to London. She worked in London for 30 years, most recently as a Drug Information Officer at the London Health Sciences Centre, where she assisted people in the hospitals, at the university and throughout the medical community.
When Susan died, Jack talked to Frances about leaving money in his daughter’s memory, and now through a gift of $400,000 he left in his will, the Vitali family is ensuring Jack’s wish comes true.
A large portion of Jack’s gift will go to Western’s Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, helping to renovate laboratories used for Studies in Fetal Programming, where Physiology and Pharmacology students will research what happens in the womb that predisposes people to diseases. An exam room in the clinical skills building will be named after Susan, a student award in Family Medicine will be funded, as well as the Susan Vitali-Lovell Gold Medal, an award to go to a student having the highest academic performance in fourth-year Honors Pharmacology.
 |
| The Vitali and Lovell families joined Western President Amit Chakma and Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry Dean Carol Herbert on April 7, 2010, during a celebration of the $400,000 gift from the late Jack Vitali. |
“Jack would be very happy with where the money is going and to know it is honoring Susan’s memory,” says Frances.
Susan’s husband John Lovell (DDS’82) notes that the family he married into is very close, adding that the reason Western has likely played so prominently in their lives is because it’s so close to home.
“We have such a great family and they just want to be close to the family,” says Lovell, who left Oshawa to follow Susan to London where he chose to study dentistry at Western. “We have a world-class university right here in our own backyard. So we have the benefit of everything – a great education and a great family close by.”
