Less Cancer Scholarship

The Less Cancer Scholarship was created to support nursing students and/or graduates at the community college level for whom public health is a priority in their educational path, and who plan to pursue educational programming in areas related to rural health and cancer prevention.

Rural Americans face many unique challenges across the cancer control continuum, from exposure and diagnosis through treatment and survivorship. Rates of cancer and stage of diagnosis can also vary widely in rural areas depending on environmental impacts, population demographics, availability of screening, and access to culturally informed treatment options. While there are comparable cancer incidence rates between rural and urban populations in the United States, the approximately 60 million rural residents face higher cancer mortality rates. Less Cancer understands this and wishes to improve cancer outcomes as they relate to prevention, access, screenings, and treatment.

Cancer prevalence, or the number of living people who have ever been diagnosed with cancer, is slightly higher in rural populations compared to urban populations. (SOURCE: National Clearinghouse on Rural Health Issues. RHIhub is a guide to improving health for rural residents.)

The scholarship may be applied to tuition, continuing medical education, workshop fees, textbooks, and/or other educational materials required for the programming that works to educate in this body of interest. Suggested classes, workshops, and CMEs pertaining to public health and cancer prevention may include, but are not restricted to, health promotion, nutrition, epidemiology, and public health.

The scholarship will be awarded to students who meet the following criteria:

• Complete the Laurel Ridge Foundation scholarship application.
• Full-time students—or graduating students—of the Associate of Applied Science degree program in Nursing (RN)
• Students who seek public health education with an interest in cancer prevention as a priority in their educational path, and who plan and can document the interested area of educational programming in areas related to cancer prevention, including social determinants relevant to rural health, such as environmental exposures, tobacco use, sun protection, healthy food, alcohol, physical activity, vaccinations (HPV and Hepatitis B).
• Submit an essay up to 500 words explaining why they are applying for the Less Cancer scholarship, what interests them in public health and cancer prevention, and what coursework or continuing education they plan to pursue.

* The scholarship is renewable.*