FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 20, 2016. Astor Weiss Kaplan & Mandel, LLP and the Council on Brain Injury Announce the 10th Annual CoBI Award Celebration to Honor Olympic Soccer Goalie Briana Scurry and Congressman Bill Pascrell and his Congressional Staff and Team
Astor Weiss Kaplan & Mandel, LLP is pleased to present the 2016 Council on Brain Injury Individual and Community Organization Awards at the 10th annual CoBI Award Celebration and Dinner on September 27, 2016 at Penn Oaks Golf Club following the David’s Drive Golf Tournament. Briana Scurry, Olympian, Gold Medalist, World Cup Champion will receive the Individual Award and Congressman Bill Pascrell, Jr. and his Congressional Staff and Team will be honored with the Community Organization Award.
Briana Scurry is widely recognized as one of the world’s most talented and influential goalkeepers. Her 173 international appearances as one of the first African-American professional female soccer players helped significantly diversify the sport. Named starting goalkeeper for the United States Women’s National Team in 1994, she led the team on an illustrious run that included two Olympic gold medals. In the 1999 FIFA World Cup Championship – which represented one of the most seminal events in American athletic history – Briana made the iconic shootout save that carried the United States to victory. Briana pioneered the first paid professional women’s soccer league as a founding player in 2001. As captain of the Atlanta Beat, she competed in two WUSA Championships. In 2010, Briana suffered a debilitating concussion that led to her retirement. Since then, Briana has repurposed her visibility to become one of the nation’s foremost thought leaders on traumatic brain injuries. Through her immeasurable impact on the landscape of women’s soccer and American sports culture, Briana received the National Association of Black Journalists’ Sam Lacy Award, inclusion in the United States Women’s National Team’s All-Time Best XI, and a permanent feature as the Title IX exhibit in the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. As one of the first African American and openly LGBT professional female soccer players, Briana Scurry has championed diversity and equality throughout her legendary career. The epitome of a team player with a palpable love of the game, Briana draws on her resiliency to advocate for equality, traumatic brain injury awareness, and the development of women’s soccer.
Congressman Bill Pascrell, Jr. founded the Congressional Brain Injury Task Force (CBITF) in 2001 to further provide education and awareness of brain injury (incidence, prevalence, prevention and treatment) and support funding for basic and applied research on brain injury rehabilitation and development of a cure. Injuries that cause brain injuries could be caused by anything from being a car accident or injury at work. If you or your loved ones find themselves in a situation that results in brain injuries, you may want to seek help from a law firm similar to Valiente Mott to help you get compensation. Since then, Congressman Pascrell and his Congressional Staff and Team have been raising awareness of traumatic brain injury dangers and treatments. The Task Force is bipartisan and made up of over 100 members of Congress. Once a year, the CBITF sponsors a day-long event to promote brain injury awareness on Capitol Hill which includes a fair, a briefing and a reception. The National Association of State Head Injury Administrators joins other key stakeholders in supporting this event so that brain injury advocates have an opportunity to learn about cutting edge issues with regard to research, prevention and practice.
The awards will be presented on September 27, 2014 at the Council on Brain Injury’s annual award dinner at Penn Oaks Golf Club in West Chester, PA. The dinner immediately follows CoBI’s golf fundraising event, David’s Drive.