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Champion for Cures Nominations Now Open
Photo credit: OHSU Foundation
AACI cancer center directors are invited to submit nominations for the 2021 Champion for Cures Award.
AACI established the award in 2018 to recognize an individual or individuals who, through direct financial support of an AACI cancer center, demonstrate exceptional leadership in advancing cancer research and care and in inspiring others to do the same.
Selected by the AACI Board of Directors, the awardee will have gained distinction through their visionary approach to promoting our shared goal of a future without cancer. Through their transformational philanthropy, which may take many forms—including supporting a new facility, cancer center infrastructure, or programming—the cancer center can focus beyond immediate needs to foster creativity and innovation and multiply its impact on patient health, research, and its surrounding community.
The Champion for Cures Award was presented virtually at the 2020 AACI/CCAF Annual Meeting to Nike, Inc. co-founder Phil Knight and his wife, Penny (pictured). The Knights have demonstrated their commitment to the cancer community for over a decade, beginning with a $100 million gift in 2008 that was used to recruit the best and brightest researchers to the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU). Beyond their significant financial support, the Knights have also helped build a network of people who are invested in the success of Knight Cancer Institute.
The 2019 award was presented to Brynn and Peter Huntsman of the Jon M. and Karen Huntsman family, whose first major gift to cancer research came in 1993 at $10 million, followed by a $100 million gift in 1995 that formally established and named the Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah. In 2018, AACI presented the award to Richard and Susan Rogel in recognition of their $150 million gift to the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center, which was renamed Rogel Cancer Center in their honor.
Please contact Shelly Pocratsky, development coordinator, with any questions about the 2021 award cycle.