The award, now in its 13th year, honors community leaders who exemplify the qualities and characteristics women strive to achieve in motherhood as well as in life.

We are honored to present Mary Teichert with the Mother of the Year award at Polo for Change on Saturday, June 8th. 

“Service is the rent we pay for being.”

These are words that Teichert Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Mary Teichert lives by, and words that she quoted when asked why and how she became involved with Saint John’s.  A supporter for years, beginning under the tutelage of her father Fred Teichert (Executive Director of the Teichert Foundation), Mary is grateful to have been raised with this edict at the forefront of her upbringing. She is working hard to instill this ideology into her own two sons, Tommy (16) and Christopher (13).

“I’m fortunate to be part of a family that has always placed the highest importance on giving back to the communities we serve,” observes Teichert.  “This is the corporate climate we’re blessed with as well – Teichert employees are very open-hearted and generous people.  When I announced that I was going to volunteer for a service day at Saint John’s last March, 115 people signed up to come with me!”

“Community Mother of the Year is a very meaningful award to us,” comments Saint John’s Vice President and Chief Development Officer Sasha Wirth.  “Each year, we thoughtfully and carefully select the community member that we feel best exemplifies the seven core values that we instill in our clients: community, courage, effort, gratitude, growth, love and respect.  Mary is the personification of these values, as a woman, as a community leader, and most importantly, as a mother and as a wonderful, powerful, loving role model to her two boys.”

A Harvard MBA, Teichert has excelled in the construction industry, one that has been dominated by men for years.  With 2400 employees and a footprint that reaches from the Bay Area to Reno, and from Long Beach to Marysville, Teichert Inc. has been building infrastructure and producing building materials for over 130 years.

The construction industry, Mary notes, has one of the smallest gender pay gaps in the country.  “One of my quests is to get more women to see what an interesting and productive industry this is, and to encourage them to choose it as a career path,” notes Teichert. 

Having become a single mom in 2015, Teichert has a deep appreciation for the struggles our mothers face at Saint John’s.  “I have the benefit of family support and resources, as well as a former spouse who is still very much a part of my boys’ lives,” observes Teichert. “Most of the women at Saint John’s do not have any of those advantages, yet they still persevere.  My hat is off to them, each and every one of them.”

Thank you Mary, for all that you do.