John Kane '99

John Kane was in sixth grade when his father passed away. Kane’s mother, faced with raising the family alone, strongly pushed him towards the Prep, and a summer in the Pre-8th Program sealed the deal.

“She really valued the Prep’s motto of becoming a ‘Man for Others,’ and that the Prep wanted to help young boys become men,” Kane says. “Looking back, I can see that she wanted to send me somewhere that would help me grow up, and the teachers at the Prep made that happen.”

Kane remembers teachers who took the time to teach lessons beyond the curriculum, such as Rev. J. Vincent Taggart, S.J. offering etiquette lessons during World History, or Mr. John Groch discussing relationships during Religion class. “In a lot of ways, they taught me what it meant to be a man,” Kane says.

Kane, who played ice hockey growing up, joined the newly established lacrosse team as a sophomore, and played for the Catholic League title during his senior year. He also points to the Kairos retreat during his senior year as being truly memorable. “The sense of brotherhood the Prep and Kairos brought about in my life still exists today,” Kane says. Mostly, though, he points to the intangible life lessons learned at the Prep as what he treasures most.

“To this day, I try to ask myself how I can be a man for others,” he says. “That can be monetarily, with time, talent, or just thinking of others first.”

His chosen career, financial planning, reflects that Man for Others mentality. “I was at Widener and they were starting this new major, a Financial Services Track,” he says. “They had a panel discussion in which financial planners talked about how much they loved their jobs because they were helping people achieve their dreams. I thought that was a great way to live.”

He started at a local credit union, where he worked his way up from Assistant Planner to Financial Planner. After building up a client base and having success, Kane and his former mentor left to start their own firm, Delphi Wealth Management Group. “We wanted to do more for our clients than we could at the credit union,” he says. “It’s been great as we’ve attracted many of our former clients and have been able to implement the additional resources we were searching for.”

Kane’s attitude of helping others also includes his family. When his nephew, Ty Black ’18, was ready to choose a high school, Kane encouraged him to attend the Pre-8th program and offered to assist with tuition if he wished to attend the Prep. In many ways, it was a payback to his brother, Richard, who took on a father figure role for Kane and filled in at many father-son events at the Prep.

“I really wanted the Prep for Tyler, because I know what it did for me,” he says. “It turned out exactly how I hoped it would. He embodies the Prep; he’s a Man for Others; he puts others first. He’s a true product of the Prep.”

Now, Kane is ready to help other students while his young ones (he and his wife, Stephanie, have two sons, LJ and Conor, and a third child due to arrive any day) are still a ways away from attending the Prep. He has made a five-year commitment, with most of it going to financial aid for a student who has lost a parent.

“My mom sacrificed everything to raise us and to send me to a great school,” he says. “If I could help a family like that, that would be incredibly satisfying.”
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