about our Partner

For over 25 years the Jeffrey Pride Foundation has chosen to direct the funds we raise to the Children’s Oncology Group (COG) because it is the world’s largest organization devoted exclusively to childhood and adolescent cancer research with nearly 100 clinical trials in progress at any given time.  

COG’s collaborative research is done by over 9,000 experts at more than 200 leading children’s hospitals across North America, Australia, New Zealand and Europe.  In the Chicago area alone COG network hospitals include Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital, University of Chicago Comprehensive Cancer Center, Loyola University Medical Center, University of Illinois, and Advocate Children’s Hospitals in Park Ridge and Oak Lawn.  It is the work of COG that will cure pediatric cancers.

The COG chairman, Dr. Douglas Hawkins, is our medical advisor.  With his guidance we determine what projects and studies will have the greatest impact in finding cures.  He provides us with feedback on the progress of these studies regularly so we may report back to our donors.  We want our donors to know exactly what their money is accomplishing!

Douglas S. Hawkins, MD, has been elected the next Group Chair of the Children's Oncology Group (COG).

Dr. Hawkins is currently the Hematology/Oncology Division Chief at Seattle Children’s Hospital and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Washington School of Medicine. After receiving his MD from Harvard Medical School in 1990, he moved to Seattle for his pediatric residency and pediatric hematology/oncology fellowship training. He joined the University of Washington faculty in 1996, where he has spent his entire academic career.

Dr. Hawkins has been the Chair of the COG Soft Tissue Sarcoma Committee since 2008 and a member of the COG Bone Tumor Steering Committee. He also chairs the COG Scientific and Discipline Chairs Committee. His clinical research has focused on the biology and treatment of pediatric sarcomas. He has been the chair of two COG clinical trials, one for Ewing sarcoma (AEWS0331) and another for rhabdomyosarcoma (ARST0531). He chairs the international EURO EWING Consortium External Advisory Board and is the Chair of the Data Monitoring Committee for the European Frontline and Relapse in RhabdoMyoSarcoma Study (FaR-RMS). He has been an author of more than 180 peer-reviewed manuscripts, textbook chapters, or invited commentaries.