Each May, the Cherry Blossom Breast Cancer Foundation comes together with family, friends and partners to celebrate another successful year. During our Champions’ Reception, we honor individuals and organizations who have made a difference in the fight against breast cancer in a manner consistent with our mission to detect, treat, educate and eliminate the disease. In May of 2018, we honored three long-time supporters of the foundation, as well as one health-industry professional from Novant Health UVA Health system.
Kelly Persons, Executive Director of the Novant Health UVA Health Prince William Medical Center Foundation was honored for her continued, successful fund-raising efforts for the Prince William Medical Center. We had the privilege of visiting their beautiful new facility this past year. Kelly’s passion for the center, the facilities, and the patients they treat, is infectious and effective. The Cherry Blossom Breast Cancer Foundation is delighted to continue our partnership with Novant Health UVA Health System in part because of the good work of Kelly and her associates.
Matt Mohler, a Foxcroft School Faculty member, was honored for his years of service in support our annual 5K Fun Run, Walk and Pooch Prance. Matt has devoted many volunteer hours to designing the cross-country course for our event, giving of his own resources and time to set up and administering the run. Matt’s dedication to creating and executing an authentic cross-country event, brings runners back year after year.
Adrienne Corti, owner and founder of Corti Design Works, was honored for her gifts in kind over ten years in the development and maintenance of our website. Each year, Adrienne has answered our call for new features, routine updates of sponsors, facts and photos, news and changes to our registration process. Although Adrianne could not be with us on the night of the event we thanked her publicly and privately for a decade’s worth of work.
Finally, we honored one of our own current board members — James P. Atkins, founder of the Cherry Blossom Breast Cancer Foundation. Jim has brought this foundation from a small, grass-roots walk to where it is today — an organization that has granted almost one million dollars to breast cancer causes. His passion, hard work, and sheer force of will has made this an organization with which we are all proud to be affiliated. We are still trying to fill his shoes, and probably will be for the next ten years.