TYSONS, Va.– PenFed Credit Union has made a $25,000 donation to Quality of Life Plus (QL+) to support innovations that aid and improve the quality of life for veterans and sustained life-altering injuries. QL+ supports engineering students with a passion for using their skills to help veterans by developing prosthetics and other solutions to give them their confidence and independence back.
“PenFed is proud to support the development of solutions that have a tremendously positive impact on the lives of our nation’s heroes by providing them with the ability to return to work and participate in activities they love,” said PenFed President/CEO James Schenck. “It’s inspiring to see veterans playing hockey, running, surfing and thriving after overcoming very difficult challenges. PenFed believes it’s more important than ever to continue supporting veterans and organizations like QL+ during this challenging time.”
QL+ student engineers develop novel technical solutions to assist and improve the quality of life for wounded veterans. Throughout the academic year, QL+ mentors, guides and supports the collaboration between veterans and student teams, PenFed said.
“At the end of the academic year, the student teams formally present each completed assistive device or modified hardware to each veteran for use in their daily life. Each project is unique,” PenFed said. “While these assistive devices are tailored to the needs of each individual participating veteran, the solutions frequently help other injured veterans.”
"The Quality of Life Plus team is grateful for this generous gift," said Charlie Kolb, executive director, Quality of Life Plus. "PenFed’s commitment to helping our military heroes is aligned with our mission to improve the quality of life of those who have served our country.”
QL+ is headquartered in McLean, Va., with its major lab at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, California. QL+ also has a dedicated lab at Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colorado. Established QL+ programs also operate at Virginia Tech, Xavier University, the University of Cincinnati, Ohio University, the University of Dayton, San Diego State University, Virginia Commonwealth University, George Mason University, the University of Texas-San Antonio, the University of Colorado-Boulder, The George Washington University, Norwich University, Rowan University, The Catholic University of America, the University of South Florida, and the United States Naval Academy.