David T. Levinson
Founder/Executive Director – Big Sunday

David Levinson is the Founder and Executive Director of Big Sunday. On Big Sunday Weekend '09, more than 50,000 volunteers of all ages worked together at more than 500 different nonprofit sites in 69 different towns and cities throughout Southern California. David and Big Sunday have been honored by many organizations, including The Religious Action Center, The Returned Peace Corps Volunteers, The Asian-Pacific Women's Center, The Western Center of Law and Poverty, and The Association of Fundraising Professionals. Last spring, David was named Best Nonprofit Leader in California by California Volunteers, Governor Schwarznegger and Maria Shriver. His book, The Help Book; A Reluctant Volunteer's Guide to Helping Out, Pitching In, and Giving Back, will be published by Hudson Street Press, a division of Viking/ Penguin, in 2010. David has also written movies, plays, television shows, novels, newspaper articles, theme park attractions, and advertising. He recently co-wrote the pilot Mercy for Sony Pictures Television.

David was glad to become involved with LCFA not long after his father, Mark, passed away following a long and hard battle against lung cancer. David's father was a former smoker who had quit smoking more than twenty years before his diagnosis. Mark, a lawyer, was a great father and husband, and a wonderful, wise and kind friend to everyone who was lucky enough to know him. David will tell anyone who will listen that as far as he's concerned, it doesn't matter how or why anyone develops lung cancer - if it's someone you love, you just want it cured. David lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Ellie Herman, and their kids Rebecca, Jack, and Izzie.

Susan A. Mandel, M.D.
Associate Clinical Professor at the David Geffen UCLA School of Medicine

Dr. Susan Mandel is a practicing internist in Beverly Hills and an Associate Clinical Professor at the David Geffen UCLA School of Medicine. Her interest in lung cancer began when her younger brother (an Emergency Medicine physician) was diagnosed with stage IIIB lung cancer at the age of 49 in 2006. His startling diagnosis, in an otherwise healthy man who had never smoked, turned life upside down for his wife and children aged 10, 14 and 16. Together with her brother, Dr. Mandel sought involvement in a national effort to raise awareness and change perceptions about lung cancer, and to promote coordination and funding of desperately needed translational research. They found what they were seeking in the mission of LCFA.

Dr. Mandel, has a history of active community involvement. As the first Medical Director of The Los Angeles Free Clinic (currently known as The Saban Free Clinic.) she spent over thirteen years overseeing the development and expansion of the Clinic's high-quality, free medical services to three clinic locations, providing over 100,000 annual patient visits. Dr. Mandel has served on several not-for-profit boards including Saban Free Clinic, Temple Israel of Hollywood, Los Angeles Regional Family Planning Council. She has also been a member of advisory committees and councils including the Woman's Health Policy Council of the Office of Women's Health, Los Angeles County, and the Porrath Foundation for Cancer Patient Advocacy. She has had numerous health-related public speaking engagements including spots on television and radio and has received numerous awards for her outstanding community service including being named the 2002 "Woman of the Year" by the Los Angeles County Commission for Women. She is married to Howard Mandel, MD, FACOG. They have two children, Mallory, age 19 and Spencer, age 21.

Lori Monroe
Founder/Vice President – Lung Cancer Foundation of America

A Registered Nurse and the mother of 2 active teen-age daughters, was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer in September 2001, at age 42. Nobody suspected lung cancer because Lori had quit smoking at age 28. While the diagnosis was shocking and devastating, the prognosis was horrifying. She could expect to live 6-8 months without chemotherapy, maybe 6-10 months with chemotherapy. Lori sought a second, third and even a fourth opinion. Finally, a Thoracic Surgeon, Mathew Ninan, teamed with Oncologist David Carbone and came up with a successful plan of care. Lori has had 5 lung surgeries and nearly a year on a clinical trial with chemotherapy and an Epidermal Growth Factor Inhibitor. Today, her status is considered to be No Evidence of Disease (NED). Since her original diagnosis, Lori has been involved with advocacy through the NCI Lung SPOREs, the NCI Cooperative Groups, and National Lung Advocacy groups. While Lori is not sure why she has been able to survive stage IV lung cancer while most others with the same stage have not, she knows she has to continue to be a voice, for herself, her children and for all the lung cancer patients who no longer have a voice. Lori lives in Kentucky.

Kim Norris
Founder/President - Lung Cancer Foundation of America

A successful management consultant who traveled the world working with Fortune 500 companies, their CEO’s and senior teams, helping them improve their bottom line profits, Kim entered the world of lung cancer when Roy, her 45 year old husband, was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer in 1997. They spent the next two years searching for hope. Roy underwent five different lung cancer research clinical trials from chemotherapy to immunotherapy to anti-angiogenisis therapies. Several years after Roy’s passing, Kim entered the world of lung cancer advocacy and became a Lung SPORE (Specialized Program of Research Excellence) Patient Advocate at UCLA, where she met David and Lori. Kim feels she is combining her skills as a successful consultant with those as caregiver to her husband and applying those skills to the world of lung cancer advocacy. Her hope is to get lung cancer research the attention and funding it deserves based on the significance of its impact on public health. Kim lives in Los Angeles.

David Sturges
Founder/Treasurer – Lung Cancer Foundation of America

An attorney and a six year lung cancer survivor, David was diagnosed 22 years after he quit smoking and a little over one year after he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro. His favorable “score” for a routine heart scan in 2002 was tempered by an incidental notation of a possible nodule on the lower lobe of his right lung. Immediate follow-up tests confirmed a small, malignant tumor – lung cancer. He underwent surgery for removal of two lobes of his right lung. The diagnosis of lung cancer was gut-wrenching, chilling and cruel since he had quit smoking and appeared in excellent health. He was ignorant that after twenty-two years as a non-smoker he was still at risk for lung cancer even though there was no family history of the disease and he was not symptomatic. After his diagnosis he became acutely aware that lung cancer is the step-child of cancer research. There are few survivors of lung cancer in a position to advocate for others suffering from or at risk for lung cancer. David's journey to recovery and his growing awareness of the sad state of funding for lung cancer research has brought him into the fold of advocacy as a means of changing the approach to funding lung cancer research for those who have not survived, for those who are suffering from the disease and for those at risk. David lives in Minnesota.