Walter Schroeder

Biography:

WALTER SCHROEDER is a Canadian philanthropist and the founder and former owner of the Dominion Bond Rating Service (DBRS). Today, he leads the Schroeder Foundation, the charitable organization he created with the proceeds of the sale of DBRS.

Schroeder grew up in Winnipeg, in a close-knit, working class Mennonite family. After completing his education, he and his wife, Maria Schroeder, moved to central Canada.

While driving to Montreal for a family vacation in 1976, Walter sketched out an idea for a new Canadian based bond rating agency he called the Dominion Bond Rating Service (DBRS). Starting with just $1,000 in working capital, Walter Schroeder built the company into one of the world’s premier bond rating agencies, with offices in New York, Chicago and London, and employees all over the world.

Schroeder sold the company in 2014 and, instead of retiring, he decided to devote his time to philanthropy. To that end, he established The Schroeder Foundation, the primary focus of which has been to improve health outcomes for Canadians.

In recent years, Schroeder has directed his Foundation to begin investing heavily in the arts in Newfoundland and Labrador. There, it has created a theatre company to produce new musicals celebrating the arts and culture of the province’s people.

Schroeder has also directed his Foundation to invest in his former North End Winnipeg neighbourhood. There, it has established scholarships and other programs that support students in some of the city’s most deprived and struggling high schools.

As this education program has evolved, the Foundation has begun to develop support services custom tailored to the particular needs of North End Winnipeg's large Indigenous student population. Some of the most innovative of these have been supports for students transitioning from high school to college and university.

Source: https://schroederfoundation.org/who-we-are 

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