Child Mind Institute – San Francisco Bay Area Raises More Than $400,000 at Inaugural Golf Tournament to Address National Youth Mental Health Crisis

Former and current professional athletes from the NFL, MLB, PGA and LPGA step up to support the nonprofit’s mission to offer greater awareness and more care for the Bay Area’s children

San Mateo, CA – The Child Mind Institute hosted its first charity golf tournament on Monday, April 25 at Sharon Heights Golf & Country Club in Menlo Park. A number of VIP players and local notables showed up to support the Child Mind Institute and help it advance its mission of transforming the lives of children and families struggling with mental health and learning disorders.

Amongst the guests included former San Francisco 49ers Steve Young, Ronnie Lott, Jerry Rice and Harris Barton; retired MLB players Barry Bonds and Vince Coleman; PGA champions Mike Weir and Rod Pampling, retired LPGA golfer Kathryn Imrie; and Olympic Gold Medalist and FIFA Women’s World Cup champion Brandi Chastain. Several members of the Stanford Men’s and Women’s Golf Teams also played and volunteered.

Raj Mathai, weeknight news anchor for NBC Bay Area and a 12-time Emmy Award winner, served as event emcee. He introduced the evening’s featured speaker, Steve Young, who spoke about his personal struggles with anxiety as a child and former professional athlete, and encouraged the crowd to “take the shame out of talking about our mental health and help our children.” Dr. Harold S. Koplewicz, president of the Child Mind Institute, and Dr. David Anderson, vice president of the Child Mind Institute’s School and Community Programs, both spoke about the current youth mental health crisis and urgent need for more extensive mental health resources for the Bay Area’s children, as well as the organization’s new Healthy Minds, Thriving Kids Project in California.

“17.1 million kids under the age of 18 in the U.S have some kind of mental health issue, which means that everyone here either loves or knows at least one child who fits that description,” Dr. Koplewicz told the room. “The one silver lining I see from the pandemic is that it encouraged people to start talking about mental health more openly and has incentivized parents to pay more attention to the mental health of their kids.”

Mathai led the evening’s live auction, which included luxury golf packages, VIP passes to BottleRock Napa Valley donated by Metallica and a Zoom golf lesson with PGA champion Graeme McDowell. But the hottest auction of the evening was a Masters golf flag autographed by many PGA greats, including Mike Weir, a former Masters champion, who walked the flag around the room for all to see.

The event was sponsored by SoFi and Warburg Pincus. The event committee includedCori Bates, Stacy Denman, Jake Leschly, Ronnie Lott, Kristin Noto, Linnea Roberts and Jennifer Sills.

About the Child Mind Institute

The Child Mind Institute is dedicated to transforming the lives of children and families struggling with mental health and learning disorders by giving them the help they need to thrive. We’ve become the leading independent nonprofit in children’s mental health by providing gold-standard evidence-based care, delivering educational resources to millions of families each year, training educators in underserved communities, and developing tomorrow’s breakthrough treatments. Together, we truly can transform children’s lives.