As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

As families flocked to the Illinois State Fair for deep-fried delicacies and dizzying rides, an essential team worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure their safety.

On a warm July evening, Simmons Cancer Institute at SIU Medicine welcomed a full house of families, mentors and supporters for its annual Summer Internship Presentation and Donor Appreciation Reception. Laughter and quiet pride echoed in the building’s atrium as the undergraduates took the podium one by one to present their cancer research projects, each created over an intense nine weeks of lab work in Springfield and Carbondale. The six students, selected from a competitive pool of 25 applicants, brought with them curiosity, persistence and a desire to help others. They left with something

On a warm July evening, Simmons Cancer Institute at SIU Medicine welcomed a full house of families, mentors and supporters for its annual Summer Internship Presentation and Donor Appreciation Reception. Laughter and quiet pride echoed in the building’s atrium as the undergraduates took the podium one by one to present their cancer research projects, each created over an intense nine weeks of lab work in Springfield and Carbondale. The six students, selected from a competitive pool of 25 applicants, brought with them curiosity, persistence and a desire to help others. They left with something