Contribute to the Kate-Jeans Gail Memorial Fund

Kate Jeans-Gail

Katherine (“Kate”) Jeans-Gail was born and raised in Portland, Oregon. She graduated from Boise Eliot Elementary School and St. Mary’s Academy in Portland in 1997, and received a BA from Smith College in 2001. Kate was involved with volunteer work throughout her life – including working with orphans through Mother Theresa’s Missionary Sisters of Charity in Calcutta. She joined the Peace Corps immediately after college and was assigned to a remote village in Morocco as a maternal-child health technician. Widely recognized by her peers and supervisors as a star volunteer, she successfully pursued a grant from the United States Agency for International Development to build a health clinic and birthing center, among other projects. Also while in the Peace Corps, Kate was elected to represent the health sector on the Volunteer Action Committee (VAC) and was a leader and trainer with the Volunteer Support Network (VSN). Kate and her fellow volunteers were evacuated at the start of the Iraq War in 2003 and Kate was one of the last Americans to leave the country. In December 2003, at the time of the accident, Kate was 25 years old, living in New York City and working for Teach For America.

Contribute to the Kate-Jeans Gail Memorial Fund