A Brief, Bright Life Lights the Way to Campus for Others
A Brief, Bright Life Lights the Way to Campus for Others
The Crofton Family Creates a Legacy of Scholarship and Hope in Memory of their Daughter Alexa
Alexa Crofton was considering several colleges in the summer leading up to junior year. An outgoing student with an open heart, a shining smile, and a head full of brown curls, Alexa had been a two-sport athlete at Foothill High School, softball and volleyball; still, she wasn’t looking to play competitively after graduation. She thought about studying business wherever she went, though. Her father, John, had enjoyed a successful career as an executive, and she appreciated his work. The colleges on Alexa’s list offered her what she wanted to study, and most would have kept her in the West—a good thing for an only child unapologetically close to her parents. There was the University of San Diego, Gonzaga, and USC. Even Boise State in Idaho wouldn’t land her too far from home in Orange County, California.
Somehow, amid the storm of admission brochures, college rankings, research, and conversations, Saint Mary’s College caught her attention. Alexa’s father remembers her initial affinity for the school being born of a combination of factors, including class sizes and graduation rates. But it was a mother-daughter trip to see the campus for themselves that the family recalls as the happy conclusion of the college search. “It was just a beautiful day. It was wonderful,” Denise Crofton recalls of the visit. “She was so excited to be there.”
“‘This is what a college should look like,’” John Crofton remembers of the words his daughter spoke to his wife.
“This is where I’m going to go.”
A sign welcoming her to campus deepened Alexa’s sense of having arrived at the school she wanted to call home for the next four years. “I don’t know what the admission’s gal said to her—I wasn’t asked into the office,” Denise says, “but when she came out, she was just beaming, and she said, ‘This is where I’m going to go.’”
Looking ahead to that first bright fall on campus, the family had no way of knowing Alexa’s time at Saint Mary’s would be heartbreakingly brief: she would be unable to complete her first year, diagnosed with an illness that would prove fatal just a few weeks after her second semester would have ended. But the connection forged with the College in just those few short months—the independence fostered in Alexa, the friendships she made, and the support she encountered—created its own remarkable story of love and legacy. Her experience inspired her parents, John and Denise, to create a perpetual scholarship in Alexa’s name, the Alexa Crofton Memorial Scholarship Fund, a gift to make the joy and the opportunity of a Saint Mary’s education possible for others.
Friends, Football, and Feeding the Squirrels
Alexa’s move to campus in the fall of 1990 abounded in its own possibility. At the end of move-in weekend, John and Denise dropped her off to meet up with a group of new friends. It was August 27, Alexa’s birthday, and the couple learned in a phone call the following day that they’d left their daughter in good hands: her newly minted Saint Mary’s support network had arranged a celebration in her honor, complete with birthday cake.
The stories her parents continue to share of Alexa’s time as a first-year student bear the unmistakable hallmarks of a fully lived Saint Mary’s experience. She thrived in her new College home. She loved the small class sizes, enjoying the freedom of expression and exchange of ideas they made possible. She made new friends in the welcoming environment she found on campus; one from Chicago brought Alexa home to spend a weekend with her that fall. There was a favorite professor: “She loved Mr. Measell,” her father recalls, laughing. She got in the habit of feeding the resident squirrels on campus upon leaving the dining hall—a friend insisted the animals began to line up when they saw Alexa coming. And then there was Notre Dame.
Alexa relished the flow between Saint Mary’s and Notre Dame and signed up for clubs offered by both. She was captivated by the start of football season and her experience cheering the team on from her seat in the stands. “She was blown away by her first Notre Dame football game,” John said. “She called us very excited the next day after she had been there.”
Alexa returned to Saint Mary’s for the start of her second semester, but she wasn’t feeling herself. “We knew something was wrong, but we weren’t sure,” John says. Within a few weeks, she made the decision to return home. She wasn’t feeling well enough to stay. Friends and staff at the College helped her pack some of her belongings, and Alexa flew home to be evaluated. Her parents welcomed her home, deeply worried. Their athletic, lively daughter had lost a great deal of weight. It took several doctors to arrive at a diagnosis, but on January 30, 1991, the family received the devastating news: Alexa had a rare form of cancer, adrenocortical carcinoma.
A Legacy Born of Love
Surgery followed, but the cancer had progressed too far to respond to treatment. Alexa returned home from the hospital; on the drive there, her parents took her to see the large sign visible outside her old school—‘Foothill High School Loves You, Alexa.’ The weeks that followed were filled with flowers and visitors. “We kind of had a revolving door,” John says. “Everyone wanted to come by and see her.” The family’s Scottish Terrier, Chelsea, kept watch, too, sleeping with her every night.
Alexa died in her father’s arms at the hospital on May 27, 1991. It was Memorial Day, and she was 18 years old.
Her smile, friendship, and kindness will never be forgotten.
– -classmate Kelly Higgins ’94,
from a letter to Alexa’s parents
Their California community grieved with Alexa’s parents. The funeral was standing room only, mourners spilling outside when no more space remained. “During the last few days, as we’ve looked at photographs of Alexa as a baby until she went away to Saint Mary’s of Notre Dame, one thought gives us tremendous comfort. We can’t think of one thing we would have done differently, one advantage that wasn’t taken, one opportunity that was missed, one time that we parted angry,” her parents shared in their eulogy. “There wasn’t a day that didn’t go by that we didn’t tell Alexa we loved her or that she didn’t express her love for us.”
Saint Mary’s also celebrated Alexa’s life at a memorial service, bringing together friends she’d made across the community. The couple returned for the service and stayed in Riedinger House on campus at the invitation of the College. They invited Alexa’s friends over for the evening, and they sat on the floor and ate pizza together. “They told us so many funny stories about Alexa that we will always cherish—and they were very impressed with the house,” he recalls, laughing.
The Alexa Crofton Memorial Scholarship Fund
This second occasion to remember Alexa also served as an acknowledgment of the place the College had come to hold in the family’s heart. During her brief illness, students, faculty, and staff continued to offer love and care for the Croftons from afar—a gentle extension of Alexa’s time as a student at Saint Mary’s—sending cards and letters and continuing to offer prayer and support. “We were very impressed with the care and concern the College gave Alexa when she was ill,” John maintains more than 30 years later. Their daughter’s time at the school may have been cut short, but it had been formative for Alexa, nonetheless. Her parents agreed that their empathetic, charismatic daughter’s legacy would be to extend the same remarkable Saint Mary’s experience to others who might otherwise not have access.
Through their transformational gift to the College, John and Denise Crofton have created the Alexa Crofton Memorial Scholarship Fund to provide greater access for students to a full Saint Mary’s experience. In addition to scholarship assistance, the fund reinforces the ongoing work by the College’s Office for Student Equity by offering financial support for other opportunities and items, from computer laptops and winter clothing to Notre Dame football tickets.
“It’s our intention that this will, in some small way, enrich the college experience for young women and aid them in attaining their goals and aspirations, both in their private lives and also in preparing them for their professional endeavors,” says John.
The scholarship has been funded with lifetime gifts from the couple and will be supplemented with a bequest from their estate.
“For generations to come, the profound generosity demonstrated by John and Denise will change the lives of students who dream of a Saint Mary’s education,” said President Katie Conboy. “Their support will empower the College to provide so many future students access to a remarkable education—and to every aspect of a fully realized experience on campus.” She added: “Saint Mary’s is deeply honored to serve as a place where Alexa’s spirit will live on in welcome and in service to hopeful first-years arriving on campus—walking where she did and beginning to imagine what their futures might hold.”
Three decades after leaving the many people who loved her, tributes to Alexa are scattered like stars. There are babies who answer to her name and tattoos that spell it out, worn every day by those who love her still. Through her family’s enduring gift to the College, Alexa’s legacy is bright and will impact generations to come. Her light will illuminate a pathway to campus for students to share in the boundless potential offered by a Saint Mary’s education.
June 1, 2024
