WKBN-TV 27 Names 2024 Remarkable Woman

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Michelle Edenfield has been selected as the local winner of Nexstar Media Group Inc.’s nationwide Remarkable Women competition, WKBN-TV 27 announced this week.

Throughout March, Nexstar’s television stations across the country spotlighted women who inspire and lead the way for other women. Nexstar television stations across 117 markets each selected four local women for consideration of their market’s Remarkable Woman based on criteria including community contributions, self-achievement and innovation, creativity and/or entrepreneurial spirit. 

As the Mahoning Valley market winner, Edenfield received a $1,000 check to be donated to the charity of her choice and will travel to Los Angeles along with the other market winners for a chance to be recognized as Nexstar’s Remarkable Woman of 2024. The winner will receive $10,000 to be donated to the charity of her choice.

In June 2020, Edenfield lost her daughter, Melina, to an aggressive pediatric brain tumor. Since then, her purpose has been to help others through the Melina Michelle Edenfield Foundation, which raises money for pediatric cancer research. The foundation recently reached a milestone of raising $1 million for research.

“Michelle Edenfield is an inspiration to everyone that learns about her mission and hears her incredible story,” said David Coy, vice president and general manager of WKBN-TV. “The fact that Michelle remains such a positive force, touching those she meets with her story and her dedication to raise funds to fight pediatric cancer, is more than impressive. It also explains why she set a 10-year goal of raising a million dollars and achieved that goal in just three years. Her story highlights the power of taking a tragedy and turning that loss into a powerful force, a mission rooted in hope, and the precious memory of her late daughter, Melina.”

Edenfield put the honor into perspective.

“You know, it’s never something that obviously I set out. This has nothing to do with why we do what we do. … I don’t know if I’ll ever feel remarkable, but I always said, and I tell my girls every day, ‘You are who you surround yourself with.’ So if this makes me remarkable, it’s because of the remarkable people that helped carry us in our story. So for all of them, I will accept that kind of honor.”

Pictured at top: From left are David Coy, vice president and general manager of WKBN-TV; Michelle Edenfield; and Lindsey Watson, WKBN-TV news anchor.

Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.