Christopher “Crick” Helfrich ’95

A native of Hartford, Connecticut, and Cleveland, Ohio, Christopher “Crick” Helfrich ’95 is a social entrepreneur and nonprofit leader committed to finding innovative solutions to community-based issues and problems. Crick, as he is known by his former classmates and teachers, attended Renbrook for eighth and ninth grade and is a member of the Class of 1995. After Renbrook, Chris graduated from Loomis Chaffee and then Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas.

Chris currently serves as CEO of Stephen and Ayesha Curry’s Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation, which he helped launch in July 2019. With a mission to unleash the potential of every child, Eat. Learn. Play. is committed to improving the lives of kids and families in Oakland, the Bay Area, and across the country. The organization supports children by fighting to end childhood hunger, ensuring students have access to quality reading resources, and providing safe places for children to play and be active. In its first five years, Eat. Learn. Play. has raised and invested nearly $70 million and become the largest athlete-driven charity in the country.

Prior to Eat. Learn. Play., Chris served as CEO of the Starlight Children’s Foundation, an organization working to transform the hospital experience for millions of seriously and terminally ill children across the United States and throughout the world. In this role, Chris oversaw the creation of two major, innovative programs that fueled Starlight’s success. First was Starlight Gowns, an effort to revolutionize children’s hospital gowns by replacing ugly, uncomfortable, and embarrassing gowns with soft, comfortable gowns that are a source of joy for the kids who wear them. Chris also spearheaded the creation of Starlight Virtual Reality, a groundbreaking program built in collaboration with Google that brings the magic of virtual reality to hundreds of children’s hospitals across the country. The program makes it possible for kids to be virtually teleported out of the hospital to almost anywhere in the world—or beyond—they dream to go.

Before joining Starlight, Chris worked for the United Nations Foundation, where he spent more than five years leading Nothing But Nets (now United to Beat Malaria), the world’s largest global, grassroots campaign to defeat malaria. During his tenure, the campaign delivered more than five million life-saving bed nets and other malaria interventions to families across 30 sub-Saharan African countries and served as a leading global health advocate on Capitol Hill during a time when global malaria deaths were reduced by 60%.

Chris was a 2024 Alumni Special Guest Speaker at Renbrook and currently serves on the Board of Directors for Starlight Children’s Foundation and the Leadership Council for Classy Awards. He lives in the Bay Area with his wife, Kate, and three children, and he can often be seen sporting his blue Renbrook baseball hat.