By Jennifer Taylor/reporter
Breast Cancer is one of the leading causes of deaths among women today, and one TCC group is doing its share to help.
Last year two TCC teachers created a SE Campus team to walk in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure.
Dr. Anamaria Shaw, SE English professor, who is battling cancer for the fourth time and who also serves on the board of the Susan G. Komen Foundation, and Lydia M. Macaulay, assistant professor of computer science, who was diagnosed with breast cancer August 2003, formed TCC Team Teal.
The team name comes from the teal color scheme on SE Campus.
Because of Shaw’s condition, she was unable to walk in last year’s Race for the Cure, but other TCC faculty and staff members along with friends and family walked the race to raise money.
This year’s race found Shaw and Macaulay both participating.
And the TCC Teal team listed 26 members spanning three TCC campuses, family and friends.
Those team members, with the leadership and efforts of Shaw and Macaulay, raised more than twice their $1,000 goal.
In all, the team raised $2,105 in support of breast cancer research and to honor their friends and colleagues who are breast cancer survivors.
An estimated 178,480 new cases of invasive breast caner are expected to occur among women in the United States this year.
Although many die from breast cancer, many women and men survive, in part because of the efforts of various organizations and research groups.
One of those organizations is the Susan G. Komen Foundation.
The Komen Race for the Cure is the largest series of 5k walks/runs in the world.
Race for the Cure started in Dallas in 1983 with 800 participants and has grown to an international event of 115 races with more than 1.3 million participants.
With the efforts of strong-willed cancer patients such as Macaulay and Shaw, the TCC Team Teal plans to continue their participation in the annual walk, touch more lives and raise awareness throughout TCC and surrounding communities.
“ Next year, we plan to have this race added to the intramural sports among the campuses, like the heart walk,” Macaulay said.
“ Hopefully, next year we will have a team from each of the campuses to compete on fundraising,” she said.
