A two-time breast cancer survivor, McChord Field spouse Kimberlee Richardson wasn't about to let a small roadblock stop her from accomplishing her goal of getting her education.

But with one child already in college and another less than two years away from enrollment, the family was closely watching every education dime and searching for additional funding from a variety of sources.

"We were applying for all kinds of scholarships," said Richardson, whose husband is a captain in the 62nd Aircraft Maintenance Squadron and due home from a deployment to Afghanistan this week.

Richardson got a huge boost recently when she won a $1,000 scholarship from the Air Force Services Club Membership Scholarship Program.

Club members and their families were given the opportunity to submit a 500-word essay on what it means to be an Air Force family. A total of 130 entries were submitted to Air Force Service Agency officials for Air Force-level consideration. Richardson was selected as one of the 25 winners.

"It was super exciting," Richardson said of being selected. "A very prideful moment for me."

When it came to writing the essay, Richardson had more than enough life experience stored up to write a quality piece.

"The only hard part was condensing it down to the 500-word limit," she said.

Raised by a single mother who worked as a civilian on Offutt Air Force Base, Neb., Richardson spent a lot of time socializing with military children and their parents.

"I married into the Air Force almost 17 years ago," Richardson wrote in her essay. "Looking back, knowing what I know now, it is very easy for me to see that those families from my youth took care of us, not because they were my mother's friends, but because they were her family - her military family."

Those bonds with military families grew even stronger throughout the moves across the country and perhaps most when Richardson was diagnosed with breast cancer.

"I had friends who accompanied me to my treatments when my husband couldn't, and helped the kids with homework, rides or whatever else they needed when I was feeling under the weather," Richardson wrote.

Now cancer free, Richardson is ready to work on her goal of finishing an online speech and language pathology program offered through Chemeketa Community College.

She hopes to eventually work for a school district helping students with speech impediments.

The scholarship money will help pay for textbooks and class credits.