Ava Natasha Schwartz

Ava Natasha Schwartz, 19, of Eugene, Oregon, died at 3:15 p.m. on Jan. 19, 2025, with her mother, father, and stepmother at her side, after exhibiting extraordinary grace and courage during a 19-month battle with an aggressive childhood cancer. 

Ava graduated from South Eugene High School in 2024 with a perfect 4.0 grade point average, a year after her diagnosis of stage four alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma. 

Her early schooling included Eugene’s Adams Elementary and the Village School. Besides academics, Ava was passionate about dance and theater, having studied and performed from childhood on with Eugene Bhangra, Flex Studios, and Xcape Dance Academy. During childhood, Ava also acted in several plays at Actors Cabaret, including a role as an orphan in the musical, Annie.

After undergoing a year of treatment for cancer, Ava learned in the summer of 2024 that the disease had returned. Her response was to become more boldly adventurous, including taking a whitewater rafting trip on the Lower Salmon River, offered by the LEAP (Life Expanding Adventure Program), a nonprofit organization that “empowers people overcoming extreme adversity by providing therapeutic wilderness programs.”

That experience excited a new passion, which Ava pursued as often as she could, supported by family and friends. “Also during her treatment, although naturally stunning, she discovered an interest in glamour makeup application, products, and fashion,” her mother recalls.

Ava also will be remembered as an extraordinarily kind and loyal friend who took sincere pride in her friends’ successes; as a naturally funny person always in on the joke; interested in (and usually the winner of) board games; and always ready for carnival rides and amusement parks. She had self-confidence in her abilities, such as deciding shortly before her diagnosis that she wanted to do lifeguard training, even though she wasn’t yet a proficient swimmer.

As for her future, after volunteering during middle school with the University of Oregon’s Early Childhood CARES program, which provides early intervention and special education programs to young children in Lane County, Ava intended to become an occupational therapist working with children. She also hoped to become a mother herself someday, having valued the experience of being a big sister and exceptionally loving to her siblings. Loving and caring for numerous family pets also gave her great joy.

Even throughout her illness, Ava focused more on others — family members and friends — whom she loved, and her caring personality and charming conversation won the hearts of many nurses and caregivers.

Ava’s survivors include her mother, Karin; her father and stepmother, Robert and Jill; two sisters, Aliyah and Naomi; and grandmothers Margaret and June. Her little brother, Marcus, died in 2011, the day before his second birthday.

A celebration of life will be planned for this spring. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Ava Schwartz account at any Oregon Community Credit Union branch (member #1030451) to help with medical and funeral expenses, or to the LEAP program online at leapadventure.org.