Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer among American women, with one in eight being diagnosed.

While great advances are being made to find a cure and lots of research dollars are being spent, 40,000 women loose their battle with the disease every year. One of those women was Debbie Meyer, the mother of Aggie, Mandy Meyer. Mandy is using her loss to help others.

For Texas A&M Senior, Mandy Meyer, breast cancer is a disease she knows all too well. Not because she's battling it herself, but because her mother lost her fight with breast cancer about a year ago.

"Even when she found out she was diagnosed with breast cancer, she fought until the very end," Meyer said. "She just started declining a whole lot. It was months and then weeks to days."

Since then Mandy embarked on a mission to advocate breast cancer research by trying her best to raise funds to find a cure for the disease that took her dear mother's life.

So this past summer, when she was given the chance to model for Campus Girls USA and represent the Big XII, Mandy jumped at the opportunity because....

"I saw an advertisement saying that it goes towards breast cancer awareness for research and everything and I was very interested in it because I know my mom would want to support me in something like this," Meyer.

With 100 percent of the funds going to breast cancer research and her goal of raising more than $160,000 by the end of December, Mandy sets up her table every time she's given the opportunity to sell her calendars and along the way she's able to spread her message.

"It is a very more acceptable thing in society to get check and it's OK to talk about it," Meyer said. "My mother, she was a wonderful woman, I miss her every single day. I wish I could talk to her and it's very unfortunate that she won't be there for the day when I go get my Aggie ring in November, but I know she's here in my heart."

With her mother's passing, Mandy and the rest of her family are determined to raise as much money as they can so others won't have to lose someone they love.

"My mother was the backbone in our family, she literally did everything," Meyer said. "I look up to her."

Just in case you're wondering, Mandy is Miss September in the Calendar and if you'd like to buy one of the calendars, she'll be selling them at Loupot's Bookstore off George Bush Drive this Saturday before the Texas A&M-Colorado game.