In 2022, Ava Jones was an outstanding high school basketball player, heading for a college career at the University of Iowa, when her life changed in a moment.
Jones was walking with her parents and younger brother in Louisville, Kentucky, when an impaired driver jumped the curb and struck them. Ava and her mother Amy were seriously injured, and her father Trey died days after the incident.
The University of Iowa honored Jones' scholarship to attend college, though she was never able to play as a Hawkeye. During her sophomore year in 2025, she was diagnosed with stage four Hodgkin's Lymphoma, and underwent chemotherapy in Iowa City. Ava announced she was in remission in September 2025, and she talks with host Charity Nebbe about living with and processing these experiences, while looking toward a different future than she had anticipated when she was 17.
Later in the episode, Cathy McMullen of Iowa State University joins to talk about woodland wildflowers that are beginning to bloom around the state, and how Iowans can grow their own.
You can sign up for wildflower bloom reports from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.
Guests:
- Ava Jones, junior studying journalism and lifestyle medicine, University of Iowa
- Cathy McMullen, adjunct associate professor of natural resource ecology and management, Iowa State University
