Teen Jeopardy! champ donates portion of winnings to cancer research in honor of Alex Trebek
Avi Gupta has always looked up to Jeopardy! host Alex Trebek, and after winning the game show's Teen Tournament this June, he knew exactly where a portion of his winnings would go.
Gupta, 18, took home $100,000, and he's donating $10,314 — an homage to pi — to pancreatic cancer research. Trebek shared in March that he has stage 4 pancreatic cancer, and November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month. Gupta, a freshman at Columbia University, said he was "devastated" by Trebek's diagnosis, and "knew that whatever I could do to help, I was going to try and do that — not just for him, but for the millions of others who suffer from cancer."
Trebek is spending this month educating the public about the risks and symptoms of pancreatic cancer, and Gupta said he knows that if "anyone can beat this disease and this diagnosis, it's Alex."
