Time for a Re-Set: Challenges 5 and 6

Who knew that a little pull to a medial collateral ligament (MCL) could take a person so far off her game?  It's been over a month, and I'm still limping.  Any attempts at running are distant memories, and I learned the hard way last week jumping up to grab a silly exercise ball that my knee is NOT jump-ready.  However, I am pleased to report that I am slowly starting to get back on track.  I need to do a major overhaul of my entire list of 2011 Challenges, given that the knee injury sidelined some, and my upcoming trip to Jordan has placed different ones front-and-center.  But this post is about two challenges that are being dusted off -- and one's even being put on the fast track. They are rock climbing (Challenge 5) and the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) book project (Challenge 6).

Rock climbing had fallen completely off my list of activities on Saint Patrick's Day when I hurt my knee but I'm happy to report that, with a little help from two friends, I got to get back on the Saint Mike's climbing wall last week.  My ever-patient student, MDG collaborator and climbing coach Amanda was on hand to help, and Alyssa, another student and MDG collaborator took up my challenge to try it out for the very first time.  She managed to get all the way up on her first go -- impressive.

Here's Amanda showing Alyssa how to tie the ropes before she starts her climb

Alyssa coming down after her impressive first climb all the way to the top

Me trying to learn how to lean to the side for more leverage in a hold -- it's harder than it looks!

As for the MDG book, we need to get into our speediest mode for two reasons.  One is that we need to get a substantial amount of the text actually written this summer.  Early summer is also when we're headed out -- in four country case teams and with incredibly generous support of the office of the Academic Vice President of Saint Mike's, Karen Talentino -- to make it all happen.  Last Friday we got a chance to share some of the work in progress at Saint Michael's College's third annual student symposium. I'll be doing a whole post on the MDG book project and where we're at with it, but for now, wanted to post some pictures from the day of students involved in the MDG project presenting at various research venues throughout the day.

Here are Alyssa and Jerry working on a poster presentation on how Ecuador is doing on the Millennium Development Goals

Connor (part of the team for MDG 2) reporting on the problems of water scarcity for the refugee population in Jordan that we researched together last summer with Siham

Alexsis (part of the team for MDG 8 and the Palestinian Territory case study) giving a presentation on her last summer's Provost Grant research on the financial crisis in the EU

As I mentioned above, there's a ton of work to be done this summer, and teams of students (and I) will be writing feverishly in the months ahead.  But for now I wanted to send out a little post as a shout-out to the students on this project and what they've already accomplished.  Now it's back to our last two weeks of school -- classes this week and finals next -- to finish out the semester.

I made Jerry and Alyssa (Team Ecuador) and Matt and Annie (Team Bangladesh) pose with me  in front of their posters on those topics