September is Prostate Cancer Awareness Month and PHEN is raising prostate cancer awareness during the State Fair Classic at the famed Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Texas on September 30th. This is the Annual Football Classic between Prairie View A&M University and Grambling College State University, two legendary Historically Black College (HBCU) football powerhouses. The game will be played before an audience of more than 50,000 (based on the 2022 audience) at the Cotton Bowl and broadcast live on ESPN+.
PHEN’s awareness efforts will be highly visible. The Prairie View Panthers (PVAMU) football team will wear blue T-shirts with PHEN’s ribbon logo during pre-game activities. During the game, the players will wear a special compression sleeve with the PHEN blue ribbon logo. US Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee of Houston and Rev. Dr. Frederick Haynes III, Pastor of Friendship-West Baptist Church in Dallas, are supporting this effort with prostate cancer awareness messages that will be played on the jumbotron video screen. PHEN has a full-page advertisement in the souvenir booklet to be distributed to attendees. In addition, PHEN will distribute awareness flyers with a team of volunteers from the Friendship-West Baptist Church who first partnered with PHEN in 2015.
Players’ Sleeve with PHEN Blue Ribbon Logo
“We are thrilled and excited with the opportunity to participate in the State Fair Classic and to have the support of Prairie View A&M and leaders from Dallas and Houston in the fight against prostate cancer. We are confident that the men and families we reach during this event will benefit from the increased awareness about prostate cancer and its deadly impact on Black men, and we pray that lives will be saved,” says Thomas Farrington, PHEN’s President and Founder.
DeWayne Charleston, PHEN’s Survivor Network Texas ambassador and PVAMU alumnus, coordinated the state fair prostate cancer awareness effort with Dr. Keith Crawford, PHEN’s Director of Clinical Trials and Patient Education, also a PVAMU alumnus. PHEN plans to leverage its presence at this event to expand ongoing education and awareness programs with leaders and community partners within Texas.