The WYCC Steering Committee is responsible for making key operational decisions in conjunction with the coalition to guide cancer prevention and control efforts and accomplish the mission set forth in the Wyoming Cancer Control Plan. They focus efforts on developing priorities and increasing the visibility of the coalition and monitoring and evaluating the plan for progress on outcomes. They support the implementation of practices to help sustain WYCC efforts and monitor the progress of the WYCC, ensuring timely action on issues raised during meetings. The committee is also responsible for attending steering committee meetings as well as coalition meetings, recruit new members and organizations, appoint committees, as necessary, and communicate the mission and vision of the coalition.
Steering committee members meet at least quarterly, with two face-to-face meetings held in conjunction with the bi-annual WYCC meetings and two conference calls. Additional meetings or calls may be scheduled based on work projects. Members are also asked to serve a two-year term, which may be renewed.
WYCC Steering Committee Members
Rachel Ceballos, PhD
Associate Professor, Department of Family and Preventive Medicine’s Division of Public Health, University of Utah
Senior Director, Community Outreach and Engagement, Huntsman Cancer Institute
Rachel Ceballos, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Family and Preventive Medicine’s Division of Public Health at the University of Utah, Senior Director of Community Outreach and Engagement at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI), and an HCI Endowed Chair for Cancer Research. She is interested in understanding the psychological and social impact of cancer, especially in communities that experience unequal health outcomes. She has experience working with African American, Native American, and Latino communities, is committed to the practice of community representation at all levels of the research process, and co-learning between researchers and the communities we serve. Dr. Ceballos collaborates with community partners to identify, develop, and evaluate cancer prevention and cancer survivorship interventions. Prior to arriving at the University of Utah and Huntsman Cancer Institute, she was an Associate Professor in the Division of Public Health Sciences at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center and an Affiliate Associate Professor in the Department of Health Systems and Population Health at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA. She brings significant experience building community partnerships with the goal of creating community-centered interventions and reducing factors that contribute to unfair differences in cancer prevention and control.
Lisa Eades
Co-Founder, Volunteer President/CEO
Jason’s Friends Foundation
Lisa Eades is a co-founder and volunteer President/CEO of Jason’s Friends Foundation – a non-profit that provides financial resources for Wyoming families who have children suffering from life-threatening brain or spinal tumors and other childhood cancers. Jason’s Friends was established in 1996.
In addition to her work with Jason’s Friends Foundation, Lisa co-chairs the Wyoming Cancer Coalition. She has a passion for cancer prevention and control, especially childhood cancers. Lisa helped establish Camp Courage Wyoming in 2012 – Wyoming’s only childhood cancer camp. She serves on the Wyoming Department of Health’s Institutional Review Board. Lisa also serves on the Wyoming Palliative Care Advisory Council, appointed by Governor Mead.
Lisa is part of the Wyoming Cancer Coalition’s Childhood Cancer workgroup. Five year goals are to expand resources for patients and families, including palliative care and end of life care and to provide hands on training for healthcare providers related to childhood cancer and post survivorship needs.
Lisa and her husband Rocky are Jason’s parents as well. Tragically, Jason lost his battle with a brain tumor at the age of nine, in 1995. Jason’s Friends Foundation was created in Jason’s name to help Wyoming families who have children with cancer. Jason’s Friends currently has 145 families enrolled and has provided nearly $6 million in financial assistance.
Joe Grandpre, Phd, MPH
Chronic Disease and Maternal Child Health Epidemiology
Wyoming Department of Health
Joe became interested in cancer prevention and control because cancer is the second leading cause of death in Wyoming and because it sucks. He joined the WYCC because Chris Thomas asked him to join in 2002. Joe would tell individuals interested in joining the WYCC that while there have been many strides in treating cancer in the last decades we still need to work on prevention. We will never prevent all cancers but delaying cancer as long as possible is a worthwhile and noble goal for all of us.
Jennifer M.L. Stephens, MA, PhD, RN, OCN, CCNE
Assistant Professor
Fay W. Whitney School of Nursing, University of Wyoming
Dr. Jennifer Stephens is an assistant professor in the Fay W. Whitney School of Nursing at the University of Wyoming. She is a professionally trained historian and long-time oncology nurse with over 20 years of clinical nursing practice in critical, acute, and out-patient oncology care. Jennifer has also worked hospice and palliative care and has a deep knowledge of the cancer care journey experienced by oncology patients. During her time in the Pacific Northwest, Jennifer worked for the Legacy Good Samaritan Cancer Center (Portland) in the in-patient unit serving medical, surgical, and radiation patients. In this setting, she was trained in autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). This specialized experience allowed her to secure a position in the Leukemia/Bone Marrow Transplant (L/BMT) unit at Vancouver General Hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in 2007. Jennifer worked in this critical oncology setting for 15 years before “retiring” to move back to the U.S. in 2022. During her time at the L/BMT unit, Jennifer worked with a variety of cancer patients providing acute chemotherapy, autologous, allogeneic, and umbilical cord stem cell transplants, as well as CAR T-cell treatments. This incredible clinical experience led her to pursue a PhD in nursing from the University of British Columbia (UBC) under the supervision of Dr. Sally Thorne. Jennifer’s dissertation centered on the disease identity experience of cancer patients and explored the differences of embodiment of cancer expressed by solid tumor patients and hematological cancer patients.
During that time, Jennifer began working as a nurse educator and clinical preceptor. She graduated in 2018 and worked as a nursing instructor for UBC as well as the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT). In 2018 Jennifer took an assistant professor position with Athabasca University, a large international virtual university headquartered in Athabasca, Alberta. She served in the Bachelor of Nursing Program Director role and then as the Associate Dean Undergraduate Programs. During this time, Jennifer’s research became focused on rural patient care and nursing training. She left these positions in August 2022 to return to the U.S. and live closer to family. She joined the nursing faculty at the University of Wyoming and has secured local and national grants to explore the cancer patient experience for rural Wyoming oncology patients.
Jennifer grew up outside Cheyenne, and she currently lives with her family on a rural ranch not far from that homestead. She understands the passion that drives people to live in a rural community and embraces that heartiness and spirit of freedom that define Wyomingians.
