The Huntington Way - Episode 07 with Guest Steve Schuck

Originally Aired: May 7, 2022

Guest: Steve Schuck

Huntington Learning Center Website: https://huntingtonhelps.com/center/colorado-springs

Huntington Learning Center Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HuntingtonColoradoSpringsCO/

Huntington Learning Center YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCur1jYqh8vCL2IwjYzpULcg

Steve Schuck’s career resume reads more like an adventure, a mission to succeed and to lead. It began with an economics degree from the Wharton School of the University
of Pennsylvania. Following graduation, he became a math teacher and head football coach at Manlius, prep school for WestPoint. After two years in New York City, he and his wife, Joyce, a published author, headed west. They have three children, six granddaughters, two grandsons and three great granddaughters.

 

The business Steve founded is wholly owned by the Schuck family. In the more than 50 years since its beginnings, the company has grown from a small real estate
brokerage enterprise to a major developer of commercial, residential, industrial and mixed-use projects in multiple markets.

The Schucks have, or had, more than 50 joint ventures and partnerships, creating and developing more than 5,000 residential home sites and 10,000 acres of commercial
projects in the Denver, Colorado Springs, Portland, and Phoenix markets, valued in the billions of dollars.

Steve Schuck’s leadership has also extended to many community and civic challenges, including being or having been a trustee of the Daniels Fund and Alliance for
School Choice, Life Skills Center, Rocky Mountain Community Foundation, Step 13, the Bighorn Center, the Colorado Alliance for Reform in Education, Independence Institute (past Chairman), CACI, Kids Voting, The Career Building Academy, Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce, Pikes Peak Y-USO, Junior Achievement, Boy Scouts, Western National Bank, Penrose Hospital, National Jewish Hospital, and the UCCS and CU Foundations.

As a founder or co-founder of both the state and the Colorado Springs private economic development programs, the Greater Denver Corporation, the Colorado Leadership Forum, and the Republican Leadership Program (now the Leadership Program of the Rockies), his entrepreneurial accomplishments reach far beyond business. 

 

Presently his focus is on improving public policy, both in Colorado and nationally, so that all parents, regardless of their circumstances, are empowered to choose the education they think is best for their children.  In early 2003, his efforts contributed to the passage of Colorado’s HB 1160,then the country’s newest and strongest school choice legislation.  And he and Joyce have backed up their commitment to education by creating and funding Parents Challenge, which has provided scholarships and grants to more than 1700 disadvantaged kids in both public and private schools.

 

He has been named “Citizen of the Year” by the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce, the Colorado Association of Homebuilders, the Urban League, the Board of Realtors, the El Paso County Republican Party, and has received a medal of merit from the University of Colorado Board of Regents, Step 13’s first award of leadership, the David S. D’Evelyn Award for Inspired Leadership from the Independence Institute, the YMCA’s Woodgate Award and the National Center for Neighborhood Enterprise’s Achievement Against the Odds “Pharaoh” Award and, with Joyce, was chairperson of the Easter Seals Telethon, the March of Dimes Mothers March, and received the Lions Heart Award from CSCS. 

Gov. Owens proclaimed Oct. 15, 2004 as Steve Schuck Day.  Steve also received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor Award, was named Honorary Dean of Real Estate by the Franklin L. Burns School of Real Estate, Daniels College of Business, University of Denver, received the Colorado Springs Gazette newspaper’s Freedom of Spirit Award, was honored by the Red Cross with its Humanitarian Award, and by the mayor of Colorado Springs with his “Spirit of the Springs” award.

 

Steve Schuck believes passionately that “Everyone will benefit when business entrepreneurs bring their real world experience and talent, developed in the competitive
marketplace, to society’s challenges.”

 

So he took his thoughts on improving government even a step further. He ran for the Republican nomination for Governor of Colorado in 1986, hoping to apply his
community and business leadership to the challenges facing his state. He lost by fewer than 3,000 votes, but made, and still makes, important contributions to the political landscape. As a candidate, he was endorsed by the Denver Post, which praised his “restless energy, driving intelligence, infectious humor and contagious need to do something.”