Komen for the Cure Names College Scholarship Recipients

DALLAS – July 21, 2009 – After losing their mothers to breast cancer, Lin Ling, Samantha Muilenburg, Asimina Trigonis and Heather Zurek have been selected to receive college scholarships geared to the children of people who have died of breast cancer, from Susan G. Komen for the Cure®, the world’s largest and most progressive grassroots network of breast cancer survivors and activists.

The Susan G. Komen College Scholarship Award Program was established to help students who would otherwise find attending college to be a significant financial burden, due to the loss of a parent to breast cancer. It offers undergraduate college scholarships of $10,000 a year for up to four years. Recipients of the Komen College Scholarship Award are selected based on scholastic achievement, community service and participation, financial need and demonstrated leadership potential. Recipients are expected to be ambassadors for Komen for the Cure and the breast cancer movement within their social networks and on their collegiate campus.

View Komen Scholarship Recipients

On a personal note, it was an extreme honor to have served on the Komen Scholarship Selection Committee. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1999, I was a single mom. My son was a high school senior preparing his own applications for college scholarships. It was my son who stopped his search in order to find information to educate both of us about breast cancer. He found the Komen National website. It was there I learned the ABCs of breast cancer. The result; I was very well prepared to ask the right questions of my breast surgeon, oncologist and radiation oncologist. When reading the applications of these scholars, I was reminded how breast cancer is not just an individual disease, it is a disease that affects the entire family. Early detection of my breast cancer saved my life, but these scholars lost their mothers. Each possessed the academic qualifications, but also shared their personal experience of their mother's battle with breast cancer. They described how they were positively influenced by the courage and strength of their mother's illness. They are incredible Ambassadors and Komen partners in the promise to end breast cancer forever.