Remembering a Remarkable Social Worker

The 5th Annual Teri Tough 5K Run Walk will be held Saturday, June 20, 2009 at the Heritage Park Marina and shelter #1 area in Olathe, Kansas. Proceeds from the event will help fund safety training for community health workers and social workers. Teri Mathis Zenner was a social worker who grew up in the Kansas City area. Teri touched many lives with her positive attitude, and passion for helping others. She was studying to obtain a master's degree in social welfare at the University of Kansas when she was tragically killed in August 2004 while trying to help a client in need. Her death, two days before her 27th birthday, focused national attention on safety for social workers.

Dr. Thompson played in a coed softball league with Teri and her colleagues from Johnson County Mental Health. Working with her family and coworkers, Dr. Thompson has helped organize and sponsor the Teri Mathis Zenner Memorial Run Walk events at Heritage Park, Olathe, Kansas.

In 4 years, the event has raised over $48,000 to endow a scholarship in Teri's memory for graduate study in the school of social welfare at the University of Kansas and to start a scholarship in her memory at Missouri Southern University. Teri deeply believed in helping those less able to help themselves, and would have wanted others to carry on her work. These scholarships will help others carry out her dreams of helping others.

For more information about Teri, to donate to the scholarship fund, or to learn about the June 20, 2009 event, visit www.terizenner.com or to register online click here for a direct link to the registration page on Active.com.