The daughters of Stuart Scott, the famed ESPN sportscaster and UNC-Chapel Hill alum, have turned their late father’s love of ice cream into a campaign to honor his legacy and raise money for cancer research.
In 2015, the year Stuart Scott died of cancer, his daughters, Taelor and Sydni Scott, decided to get their father’s favorite treat – ice cream – on his birthday, July 19. They posted a picture of their scoops on social media with the hashtag #ScoopsforStu, with ESPN colleagues and friends joining in.
Each year since, both Scott daughters have continued to post pictures for the campaign with the goal of raising money and awareness for the Stuart Scott Memorial Cancer Research Fund at the V Foundation for Cancer Research, which is based in Cary. The Stuart Scott Fund was created by the V Foundation and ESPN after his death. Its grants – totaling $15 million to date – are specifically directed toward two areas: research focused on racial disparities in cancer outcomes and general cancer research led by scientists from underrepresented groups.
The idea for the campaign came from a memory Taelor and Sydni Scott share from when they were young. Their father would take them for ice cream after school almost once a week, and Taelor Scott said her father would often pay for the customers behind them as his way of "paying it forward."
"That was something that he wanted to impress upon us — paying it forward, and this was kind of a little way to do it in a way that we could see, and also understand," Taelor Scott said. "And one time they came back and said the people behind us, he had paid for them, and they had paid for the people behind us, and it had gone on through the day."
Taelor Scott and her sister remembered how excited their father was that day because it illustrated the lessons he wanted to teach them. Their campaign is their own way of "paying it forward," using their dad's favorite dessert.
Sydni Scott said birthdays were always a special time in their household growing up, and she and her sister cherish being able to still honor their father's birthday while contributing to cancer research.
"It gives us a chance to remind people near my dad's birthday about what he wanted to happen in his absence, and the work that he wanted to continue happening when he couldn't be there," Taelor Scott said.
Sydni said through the time she and her sister have worked with the V Foundation, it has been "wonderful to come back to" due to the organization's commitment to its mission.
The V Foundation was founded in 1993 by ESPN and Jim Valvano, who coached N.C. State men's basketball to a national championship in 1983. Valvano also died of cancer. The foundation directly awards 100 percent of donations to research programs for all types of cancer. It has awarded nearly $290 million in grants since its founding.
"It seems like a dismal situation, but knowing that there are people attacking this every day it makes me realize, 'Oh, this makes me even more interested in developing the infrastructure to help bring these treatments to the public," Taelor Scott said about working with The V Foundation. "There is something real to work for, it doesn't feel like a lost cause."