At Ventana Vista Elementary School, Paula Collins sits on bench made in memory of her daughter, Michelle DiBenedetto, in the school's butterfly garden. Collins created the Butterfly Endowment to honor Michelle.

james gregg / arizona daily star

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A butterfly seemed to Paula Collins the perfect symbol of her 10-year-old daughter.

All grace and color and fluttering beauty, the insect is the perfect fusion of the realms of art and science — areas that jointly intrigued her daughter from a young age.

The insect goes through a kind of death as a caterpillar before emerging with a new magnificence. And with its wings, it can touch far more people than it did in its more earthbound state.

So it is with Michelle DiBenedetto, a bespectacled little girl who loved watching dance competitions and home improvement shows.

She was killed in a car wreck near Kitt Peak in April 2007. Her father, Nicholas DiBenedetto, was instantly killed, as was the 19-year-old driver who had crossed into oncoming traffic on Arizona 86 and slammed into the family's red Camry as they returned from a weekend trip to Rocky Point. Michelle's younger brother, Bryce, survived and spent 10 days in the hospital recovering.

The children were both givers. They split their allowance into three parts — some to save, some to spend and some to give to charity. In 2005, they donated $75 to the Humane Society.

They always picked out gifts for needy children at Christmas and saved box tops and pull-tabs for different charity drives. Michelle, who played in band and softball and was in Girl Scouts since first grade, was planning to volunteer to cook dinner for families of sick children the summer she was killed.

So Collins said the answer was clear when she asked herself what Michelle would have wanted her to do with the $30,000 that made up her college fund and life insurance benefit — use it to make the world a better place for kids.

The Butterfly Endowment was born, which will dole out the funding over the next five years to enhance art and science programs at the four elementary schools in Catalina Foothills School District.

And that's after an earlier gift she already made to her daughter's school, Ventana Vista Elementary. Collins had asked that in lieu of flowers, mourners donate to a science lab fund for the school. She collected $7,000.

"I just see that in order not to dwell on grief and loss, it's important to give back and to know that by giving, we can help someone else," said Collins, a 48-year-old engineer.

Although art and science may not seem like a peanut-butter-and-jelly kind of union, Collins said the two are more alike than one might think.

They're both subject to budget cuts, with schools focusing so much on other core testing areas.

And, she said, art is a starting point for children to understand science. If they're grounded in art, when they're asked to identify and observe plants, they will notice the color, the flow of the leaves, the feel of the stalks. "They're both about experimentation and observation," she said.

Ventana Vista's principal, Kim Boling, said the money will be vital. "School funding in Arizona is such that we're constantly strapped for things we would like to consider essential. This will allow us not to just do the essential, but to offer enriching opportunities as well," she said, adding some ideas include outfitting the lab with more technology or buying easels for the art studio.

Boling remembers Michelle as a delightful girl, smiling and curious about the world around her. And she credits Collins with deeply affecting her life.

"She's the epitome of always looking after others and acting in the best interest of others," Boling said. "When I heard about her gift, I certainly felt gratitude, but I also wasn't surprised because that's just part of Paula."

With grief so raw that tears spill unchecked a year later, Collins recalled going to the school the week after Michelle's death to talk with the students.

"A lot of times, parents don't talk to their children about death. I wanted to give them a chance to see me and know that things would be OK," Collins said.

The students ended up giving her a big group hug. "I thought I was there to help them, but they really helped me."

Collins had the opportunity to talk with her daughter about death, not only when her grandfather died a few years earlier, but again just weeks before the accident, when they read a book together about a little girl whose family ran a funeral home.

Michelle asked her what happens in death. Collins explained that her own belief is that the body dies, but the spirit is set free and goes to heaven.

She recalls Michelle saying, 'If that ever happens to me, then I'll be in heaven watching over you.' "

Collins said she feels her when she watches dance shows or sees the bench dedicated to her daughter in the school's butterfly garden.

But perhaps she sees her most in the portrait that sits by her computer, the one drawn by the school art teacher, who somehow connected Michelle's smile and eyes even better than the picture she drew from.

"You see her smile and you felt good, and that's what I see here. It's like she's really here."

Only now, she has wings.