As anyone who's ever earned a college degree knows, it's not unusual
for universities to ask their students for money long after the last
tuition payment has been made.
They call them "gifts," rather than bills, after you graduate.
But few would have expected such a gift from David Busta, a 1997
graduate of UW-Madison who grew up in Chetek, a small city in Barron
County about 225 miles northwest of Madison.
Busta, now 30, double-majored in journalism and communication arts,
with an emphasis in advertising. He got a job immediately after
graduation, working in Milwaukee as a media buyer and account executive
for two ad agencies.
Milwaukee also is where his life, for a time, screeched to a halt. He
was leaving a concert at the Marcus Amphitheater one night in August 2002
when he fell 30 feet over a railing and broke his neck, severing part of
his spinal cord.
He's been paralyzed since, with no feeling in his arms or legs. Busta
spent five months in a Milwaukee hospital and almost two years in a rehab
center in Minnesota, moving just last month into his own apartment in
downtown Minneapolis, where he has a live-in caretaker to help him.
But now it's UW-Madison he wants to help. Together with his friends
from high school and his parents, Dave and Carol Busta, who still live in
Chetek, Busta has pledged the proceeds of a planned fund-raiser to
UW-Madison's Waisman Center, a $40 million research facility dedicated to
finding better treatments and cures for people with developmental
disabilities and spinal cord injuries.
Busta said he hopes to raise $25,000 with the combination basketball
tournament/silent auction on Nov. 27 in Chetek. He plans to keep none of
the money for himself, just like the first fund-raiser he and his friends
and family sponsored last year when they raised $16,000 for the
Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation using the same format.
"I didn't think it was really necessary for me to benefit from it
directly, although I hope to benefit from (the research) one day," Busta
said, just before taking a recent tour of the Waisman Center. "It's also
because of my commitment to the university and because of my being a
graduate from there."
Derek Johnson, a high school friend, said the planned gift is both a
practical use of the money and a symbolic gesture of hope.
"Our 25-grand pales in comparison to the center's budget, but at the
same time we feel like we're doing our part," said Johnson, who lives in
Waunakee. "We're trying to make a statement and keep things a little more
local now."
Waisman Center director Marsha Mailick Seltzer said the center was
honored to be the fund-raiser's beneficiary and she commended Busta for
his "tremendous altruism."
She also promised the donation, whatever its size, would not go to
waste. Many scientists use small gifts as seed money, Seltzer said, to
produce the preliminary results from small-scale studies that federal
agencies such as the National Institutes of Health like to see before
handing out bigger grants.
Such gifts also provide an intangible benefit to the giver and
recipient alike.
"It's very important in both directions," Seltzer said. "It's very
inspiring to the researchers. And (Busta) is investing in the future, and
not just his own future."
Busta and his supporters have created an account in his name at the UW
Foundation, which is UW-Madison's nonprofit fund-raising arm. Money from
the benefit will be placed in the account, then transferred by the
foundation to the Waisman Center where it will help fund the work of
researcher Su-Chun Zhang.
A UW-Madison professor of anatomy and neurology, Zhang has had success
coaxing human embryonic stem cells to become early-stage brain cells. The
cells have been transplanted into mice, where they grew into healthy brain
cells known as neurons.
With more study, scientists hope to create nerve cells that can be
transplanted into people to repair the damage caused by spinal cord
injuries and neurological diseases such as Parkinson's.
"It's very important for us to continue this work," Zhang said.
Seltzer said Busta has not been promised any direct benefits from his
donation -- such as participation in any clinical trial, should the
studies get that far -- nor has he sought any. She said he understood it
could be years before the research translates into any kind of treatment.
"There's a moral obligation on our part to be as clear as possible with
patients," she said, noting the perils of giving false hope to people in
need. "We want to give true hope," she said.
More details on Busta's personal history and the fund-raiser --
including how to bid in the silent auction, which includes sports
memorabilia signed by professional athletes -- is available at
www.bustabenefit.org.
About the Waisman Center:
* Opened in 1973, the center is named after Harry Waisman, a pioneer in
mental retardation research. It is dedicated to research and programs to
benefit people with developmental disabilities.
* It provides labs and research space for 50 faculty members from 26
academic departments. With another 300 staff members, it is the largest
interdisciplinary research center in UW-Madison's Graduate School.
* More than 250 graduate and post-graduate students receive training
there each year.
* Center clinics and programs serve more than 2,500 people each year
from around the world.
* Its $20 million annual budget comes from federal, state and private
sources.
* Grants from the National Institutes of Health provide core support
for 60 labs and research groups at the center.
* Work there includes molecular and genetic research, clinical services
and early childhood development, and research on sensory and cognitive
development, communication and social development.
* Center researchers are seeking better treatment and cures for
diseases such as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, fragile X syndrome, autism and
spinal cord injuries.
