Every year at the Annual Symposium/Convention, NSH encourages attendees to donate to a local charity, to give back to the communities that host our events. This year’s St. Louis charity is the Korey Johnson Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to teaching kids the importance of giving.
The group’s founder, Korey Johnson, is himself a histologist, having gotten his start at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, as a cafeteria employee. He worked his way up to become a lab assistant in the pathology lab in 1998. He was about to leave the hospital to pursue other opportunities, when a pathologist asked him to consider obtaining his HT certification. Mr. Johnson decided to attend the Indiana University Histology Program, and dive into histology.
In 2012, Mr. Johnson founded the Korey Johnson Foundation, to extend his care for his community outside of the lab. The Korey Johnson Foundation hosts events annually for kids in the St. Louis area, providing them with much needed items, such as backpacks and school supplies. The focus here however, is not on the items the kids are receiving, but what the kids are giving. Each participant at the foundation’s events are required to bring a canned good, which is donated to other local charities. The goal of the foundation is to instill in the community youth, the importance of helping others, even while they receive.
The foundation has donated over 2,300 backpacks to kids in need, and over 25,000 non-perishable items to local charities. Attendees at the Symposium/Convention are encouraged to aid the foundation’s efforts by donating items to fill the backpacks, such as spiral notebooks, markers, crayons, highlighters, as well as the backpacks themselves.
Click here to learn more about the Korey Johnson Foundation, and we hope to see you at the Symposium/Convention!