Harnessing Student Potential In Microfinance

Spring 2011: $2 Challenge Blog. FRCC & Univ. of Mary Washington. Jaren Seid & Shawn Humphrey

Welcome to the blog for The Two Dollar Challenge Week at FRCC and University of Mary Washington. Here is where you will post your comments, thoughts, Challenge Week pictures, and experiences. Remember, you will need to make at least one posting and one comment on another student's posting for each day of Challenge Week.

The three cardinal rules for Blog Posts:

1) Please remember that the cultural of mutual respect that is part of this course.
2) Participation in the blog discussion is required to earn the extra credit.
3) Participation alone is not enough; a thoughtful and meaningful approach in your posts is required. (Quality
counts!)

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Comment by Emily Horin on April 9, 2011 at 6:51pm: Casey- I think that's a great reflection, hopefully one everyone took out of this week! I know I certainly did!

Comment by casey callahan on April 9, 2011 at 2:25am: This was a humbling experience i cant stress enough the importance of leveling the field and really living like a third world citizen. I will always remember what i felt this week hunger, fatigue, and mostly nausea ( due to excessive ramen consumption) but i will also remember the feelings associated with those emotions, reinforcing the fact that we have it so good here and dont realize it and most of the time take it for granted

Comment by Laura Bowman on April 8, 2011 at 10:00pm: Completely eye-opening! The discussions, blog posts, and experience this week has really impacted all of us, I think. Although, we only experience a small part of what it's like to live on two dollars a day, we are more able to empathize and understand what it's like. I also better understand how lucky I am that I do not have to go hungry, thirsty, or live in extreme weather conditions without shelter. We have a lot that others don't, and if someone wants our help and we are able to give it, we should.

Comment by Sandra Curtiss on April 8, 2011 at 8:37pm: Tyler, I agree that this experience was more eye-opening than just throwing money at some charity. It may not have elicited the donations I had hoped for but it was none the less an event worth living through.

Comment by Jeffery on April 8, 2011 at 6:20pm: Thank you everyone for participating in this event. I hope your lives were enriched with a sense of thanks for what we have in the U.S. and enlighted in some way to feel even in a small way the struggles others go through being from other parts of the world who are not as fortunate. Shawn and Jaren thank you for taking the time to bring TDC to light and supporting microfinance loan giving.

Comment by Christopher Michael VanSyckel on April 8, 2011 at 6:01pm: Glad we made it to the end of our challenge. I like the solidarity that our group used, both @ UMW & FRCC, I think sharing our experiences made us more committed and more aware of what our options were. On this last day of our challenge I was truly able to understand the uncertainty that many of world's population goes through not knowing where there next income is going to come from as I'm a veteran student and reservist who just lost a 5th of my month's pay and not sure when/if my next check will be on time. This whole experience has made me grateful to be a citizen of our country, cause even with our problems we have it much better off than most. I hope to go forward from this day and be much more conscious of what I purchase and what I actually need in life. Enjoy your weekend everybody!

Comment by Jaren Seid on April 8, 2011 at 5:43pm: Great job everyone! I'm counting down the last 30mins until 4pm (Mountain time). I hope you found this to be a both a rewarding and enlightening opportunity. I was speaking to a colleague from Nepal yesterday and discussed some of the realism of our Challenge with respect to life there. A few thoughts I think you'll find interesting: 1) Boiling water is a necessity as well as filtering the boiled water. 2) Water is only available from the tap about every 2-days for a couple of hours starting at midnight. People will stay up in order to fill water tanks to provide them with a supply until the next water day. 3) Electricity, although available, is only on for about 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the afternoon.

Again, great job and thanks for making this an outstanding Challenge Week. The fundraiser by the FRCC campus

will be available through May 9th and we have $105 of $400 goal so far!

Enjoy your shower, bed, and dinner tonight and let's keep up the great work and goal of ending global poverty.

Best,

Jaren Seid

Comment by Donald Batchen on April 8, 2011 at 3:00pm: John- it is hard to believe how some do live like this everyday. Like you said one week is cake, but it is hard to imagine to live like this all the time!

Comment by Donald Batchen on April 8, 2011 at 2:58pm: The final day- I can not wait to have a full meal... it been hard this last week to go without the things that I would normally eat on a daily basis. My stomach hasn't stopped growling since the second day, I have had major headaches all day, and with a full nights of sleep still feeling exhausted. Even going through all of that I would still do this week again. It was an eye opening week and it was a great experience to see how others do live. I am excited to eat something that will fill me up tonight, but am afraid because how much my stomach might have shrank over this week, not having food constantly in my stomach. Probably more than food is a shower I can't wait for a hot shower!

Comment by John Tobin on April 8, 2011 at 2:26pm: Roxette

I completely agree, I cant wait to actually eat something. Although this week was hard, its very hard to imagine really living like this. 1 week is a cake walk compared to having this as your lifestyle.