Barbara Ann Kenefick

Kenefick, Barbara Ann
Barbara Ann Kenefick died at her home in Stamford Connecticut Sunday December 15, 2013 at the age of 84. She was born in Milwaukee Wisconsin November 28, 1929 the only child of Norman and Babette Marshall Breslauer, both deceased. Suffering from rheumatic fever as a child she did not attend school until the last year of high school and graduated Valedictorian. She attended Northwestern University and then Clarke University and received doctoral degrees from The Sorbonne in France and Columbia University.
She was a psychologist, educator and an expert in developmental problems and learning disabilities. In the 1960's she worked for the Center for Urban Education in Bridgeport. She help found the first school in the country specifically dedicated to children with learning disabilities. She worked for New York State for 20 years, establishing many programs for the developmentally disabled and oversaw deinstitutionalization programs for the mentally retarded in New York and other states. In her retirement, she continued to work full time as an educational consultant and educator. She developed programs for Children with learning differences at the at several elite private schools including The Berkshire School whose Learning Center is named for her. She was the recipient of numerous honors and awards, most recently from the Northeast Association of Learning Specialists (NEALS), an organization she founded.
Her students included persons of all means from the underprivileged to royalty. She was a kind and gentle mentor to so many. All who knew her were touched by her intelligence, grace, generosity, wisdom and humility.
In 1956 she married Donald Patrick Kenefick, MD, a psychiatrist who predeceased her. She was also predeceased by a dear family friend, Alvin Ernst, a developmentally disabled man who lived with the family for more than 50 years.
Until 2008 she was a long time resident of Chatham NY. That year she suffered a heart attack and a stroke and shortly thereafter lost her home and all her possessions to fire. Unfazed, saying "I had too much stuff anyway", she moved to Stamford and resided there close to her family and found new friendships and community.
She loved reading, poetry, music, needlepoint and her cats. She traveled extensively and had set foot on every continent. She loved the Antarctic and Arctic and was an avid collector of Inuit art.
A devoted mother and doting grandmother she is survived by her son, Timothy Kenefick and his wife Maureen Murphy Kenefick, two grandchildren, Daniel and Aubrey Kenefick, and a step-grandson Hugo Fueglein.
A service of Christian burial will be held Thursday, December 19, 2013 at 11:00 AM at Talmadge Hill Community Church,
870 Hollow Tree Ridge Road, in Darien, CT 06820
In lieu of flowers donations may be made to the Talmadge Hill Community Church.
The family has entrusted the funeral arrangements to Bosak Funeral Home & Cremation, 453 Shippan Avenue, in Stamford. You are invited to visit www.bosakfuneralhome.com to offer a note of remembrance online.