Pat O'Neill's Family Asks For Donations To MOCO's Education Foundation In Lieu Of Flowers

MONTGOMERY COUNTY, MD — The family of School Board member Pat O'Neill, who died last week, is asking for donations to the Montgomery County Public Schools Educational Foundation instead of flowers. O'Neill was the vice chair of the foundation.

O'Neill was the longest serving board member in the county's history, first elected in 1998. She was serving her sixth four-year term when she died last Tuesday, at 71.

The Bethesda resident's colleagues called her a champion of education — someone who always had the best interests of the children in mind.

"The children of Montgomery County Public Schools had a great advocate in Pat," said Yolanda Pruitt, executive director of MCPS Educational Foundation, in a statement. "She was dedicated to creating equitable opportunity for every student. I will miss her presence, her insight, and her support."

The MCPS Educational Foundation works to close opportunity gaps between Montgomery County students, through grants, scholarships, and supplies drives.

Her husband, Rick, wrote in his wife's obituary that she loved working for the Montgomery County Schools — they both graduated from Walter Johnson High School.

“She was just dedicated to the children of the county and the schools of the county and was just everything you would want in a public servant,” her husband said in the obituary.

O'Neill's family held a ceremony for her over the weekend at Robert A. Pumphrey Funeral Home in Bethesda.