Serve by Design

With temperatures still in the nineties during mid-September, the extremes have those of us in central Illinois asking, “How do we beat the heat?”  The conventional answers include staying inside (if you have air conditioning), taking breaks in shady areas, seeking out a shelter like a library or other public buildings, using fans to move the air, keeping hydrated, and similar strategies. Electronic WBGT Meter Creator: SrA Willard E. Grande II We are fairly “weather wise” in keeping up through our local news station. It does a great job of informing us about trending weather conditions related to the temperature, humidity, wind speed, and solar radiation. I noticed this late summer, as high school football athletes were preparing for the fall season, that the sports staff at the station added additional stories about a metric that is being used to measure heat stress. This device is known by its acronym – WBGT which stands for “wet-bulb globe temperature.” Now, that’s a mouthful!...

Our daughter, Melissa, graduated from SIU-E in 2004 with a degree in Kinesiology. She could have taken that preparation into several related careers: coaching, professional trainer, sports therapy, nutrition/ health education, or other related professions. Melissa chose to focus on being an elementary physical education teacher. Today, she finds it very fulfilling to build “fitness with fun” value into her students. This is her seventeenth year of teaching! Our Coach! Recently, Melissa has taken on the responsibility of coaching her fifth-grade son’s youth league basketball team She would prefer to sit on the sidelines and enjoy the games, but the team could not enlist a volunteer coach and was at the point of canceling the season due to a staffing shortage. So, Melissa reluctantly stepped up. I think her especially athletic son, Karter, had put considerable effort into persuading his mother to step into the vacancy! Even Melissa had to admit, “I think I am probably the most qualified ...