COVID-19 has proven no match for Project FLEX. It’s true that when the pandemic arrived in the spring, the Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education (KNPE) did suspend its initiative that provide in-person, structured physical activity to young men incarcerated at the
Read morePaul Wright conceives, co-edits tribute to career mentor, friend Don Hellison
One phone call changed Paul Wright’s life. Wright had completed a bachelor’s degree in biology and had spent two years working in a biochemistry lab when he determined that he wanted, or maybe needed, something else. “I thought of everything from going
Read moreUNESCO taps Paul Wright to lead forum prior to anti-doping convention in Paris
Sometimes, preventative medicine is the best medicine. Case in point: One day before the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization opens its seventh international convention against doping in sport, UNESCO will host a pre-conference forum on values-based education. Both events, which
Read moreProject FLEX culminates in campus visit for young men who glimpse opportunity
They seem like any other college students. Young. Comfortably dressed. High school graduates. Eager to participate. Curious about GPAs and friends, part-time jobs and time management. Interested in earning college degrees to pursue careers in coaching, law enforcement and music. But these
Read moreKNPE professors, grad student launch Project FLEX inside Illinois Youth Center
Opened in December 1904, the 120-acre Illinois Youth Center in St. Charles can hold 348 juvenile males in its Level 2 medium-security facility. The average daily population of 138 represents about 40 percent of that capacity. The average age is 17. Those
Read moreEngage Global contingent relates empowering lessons from Sri Lanka
How it began is worth a smile. “They arrived in Sri Lanka on 13th August,” writes Sri Lanka’s YMCA of Pamunugama, telling of its visitors from NIU and elsewhere in the United States, “and in the evening … went on a boat
Read moreEngage Global debuts in Sri Lanka
Days after the Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education’s Sri Lankan visitors left the NIU campus in late April, their hosts already were planning to book flights to Asia for August. That trip began Aug. 12 – and included four students who
Read moreSri Lankan visitors experience ways to instill social, personal responsibility through sport
Sport is spoken the world around. That certainly proved true last month in the NIU Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education, where 25 young visitors from Sri Lanka and the Maldives learned about boxing from, and taught cricket to, students from DeKalb’s
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