'27 Golf Chicago Challenge

                                                        

 

Hosted by the John Anthony George Foundation, 501c3

                  

Invite your family and friends to join along!

Complete and report scores for six nine hole rounds at one or any combination of these 7 nine hole courses in Chicago.

Regular season …

Billy Caldwell:  White tees.  2,941 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (34.1) and Slope (114)

Sydney R. Marovitz: White tees.  3,034 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (34.4) and Slope (122)

Robert Black: Blue tees.  2,361 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (31.5) and Slope (104) 

Columbus Park: White tees.  2,674 yards.  9 hole Course Rating (32.2) and Slope (103)

South Shore:  Blue tees. 2,720 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (32.9) and Slope (112) 

Indian Boundary: White tees.  Holes 1-9.  2,908 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (33.4) and Slope (112)

Marquette Park: Red tees.  2,782 yards. 9 hole Course Rating (33.4) and Slope (109)

GCC Championship: Jackson Park GC (an 18 hole layout) will feature one weekend 18 hole round. Blue tees (Course rating:  65.7. Slope: 106).

October ‘27. Date: TBD. 

Eligible to all who qualify by having completed and reported scores for the six 9 hole rounds. 

A block of tee times will be established under "Golf Chicago Challenge" at Jackson Park GC (773-496-5015) as early as 9/1/27. Call on your own for tee times.

Regular season play begins May 1 and ends on September 30.

Modified Stableford scoring:

1 point for each bogey

2 points for each par

3 points for each birdie or better

Play your courses of choice ‘at your leisure’ and report your scores to 773-230-8817 on or before 9/30/27. 

THERE ARE NO MEMBERSHIP OR ENTRY FEES.

However, any donation to the JAGF in any amount is welcome. No amount is too small:  

Venmo:  @JAGF2005 

PayPal:  pwillertcwp@gmail.com

Zelle:   773-230-8817

Simply report your scores. No official registrations steps are required.  

FAQ … 

*Can I play all my 6 regular season nine hole rounds at one course?  YES!

*Can I play 2 rounds at the same course, back to back, on the same day?  YES!

All reported points per 9 hole course are final. 

Please: By the rules golf. No mulligans. No gimme putts no matter the length.

End of regular season tally: 

1 Points earned over four of the six 9 hole rounds reported are tallied. Drop the lowest and highest.

2 Once tallied, the points are divided by 2. This average is your handicap to be applied at the 18 hole GCC championship at Jackson Park GC.

3 Final regular season results will be published to all on 10/1/27, no sooner. 

Awards:  Gold, Silver and Bronze. Each GCC championship contestant pays for their own greens fee and cart throughout.

Here’s a hypothetical example of the format and scoring …

Golfer 1.   18. 22. 17. 13. 12. 9.

60 total points divide by 2 = 30 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 6 points from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 2.  19. 10. 22. 15. 20. 12

66 total points divide by 2 = 33 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 6 points from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 3.  10. 11. 11. 12. 8. 9

42 total points divide by 2 = 21 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 2 points from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 4.   9. 11. 9. 11. 8. 7

37 total points divide by 2 = 19 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 2 points from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 5.   9. 10. 9. 10. 7. 9. 

37 total points divide by 2 = 19 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 1 point from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 6.   7. 9. 11. 9. 9. 7

34 total points divide by 2 = 17 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 2 points from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 7.   8. 9. 8. 7. 10. 6

32 total points divide by 2 = 16 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 1 point from the calculated handicap)

Golfer 8.   5. 5. 8. 7. 6. 6

24 total points divide by 2 = 12 points handicap.  (The approximate expected deviation rounded is + or minus 1 point from the calculated handicap)

Here's a hypothetical GCC championship (at Jackson Park) final results:

Golfer 1:  26 pts minus hcp. 28 =   -2 

Golfer 2:  33 pts minus hcp. 33 =    0

Golfer 3:  22 pts minus hcp. 21 =  +1.  Bronze

Golfer 4:  20 pts minus hcp. 18 =  +2.  Silver 

Golfer 5:  18 pts minus hcp. 18 =    0

Golfer 6:  15 pts minus hcp. 17 =   -2

Golfer 7:  19 pts minus hcp. 16 =  +3.  Gold

Golfer 8:  12 pts minus hcp. 12 =    0

Ties:  1. Most birdies or better.  2. Most pars.  3.  Most bogeys   4.  Rock … Paper … Scissors 😎

PLEASE ... NO SANDBAGGING REPORTED SCORES!  😧

www.anuncommwayforward.blogspot.com

Peter Willert's Portfolio Career Employment Profile

For those of you wondering what Portfolio Career Employment might look like, here is my present expression of this truly rewarding journey into the world of maximizing multiple income streams through carefully selected employment channels.  

 

Wellness Practitioner

Specializing in and advocating for ...

Physiologic, Socio-Emotional, Occupational and Financial Wellness 

                                   

Lecturer - Department of Health Sciences.

North Park University, Chicago, IL  

                 

Interscholastic Sports Official, Events Advisor & Assigner of Officials

Basketball (NAIA/Div III/JUCO/IHSA) and Volleyball (IHSA)  

Founder and President of the John Anthony George Foundation, 501c3                  

      

Summer Varsity Basketball Shootouts

Customized Golf Events

Sports 'Fun(d)' Raisers

Retirement Account Estimator and Tracker (RAET)

'Just Turn the Key' Consulting (concept and event architecture services)

Lifetime Wellness Empowerment Seminars

JAGF Vehicle Donation Program 

Retirement Account Estimating and Tracking Made Simple

AUWF proudly introduces, 

on behalf of the John Anthony George Foundation ...

Retirement Account Estimating and Tracking Made Simple

    
Confused by all those tables and pie charts provided by your retirement account website? Looking for a simple computer-based tool to estimate and track ALL of your accounts in what-if, at-a-glance, all-inclusive fashion?  

Build your confidence in following your financial retirement potential in a way never before offered. Here, we provide you with an Excel program requiring the very simplest of keyboarding skills. Add this to your strategies both you and your financial advisor can use to project and follow your retirement goals. 

Call or text us today at 773-230-8817 and we'll arrange for your very own one-on-one or group, in-person or screen-sharing, demonstration of this uniquely powerful yet easy-to-use Excel tool.

   

Serving these retirement account types ...

Account Type 1 RAET: Dividends and Gains with unrestricted and tax free burden redemption at retirement and defined contribution limits.

For example ...   Roth IRA  -  Mutual Fund Accounts  

Account Type 2 RAET: Dividends and Gains with required minimum and tax burden redemption at retirement and defined contribution limits.

For example ...   Standard IRA  -  Simple IRA  -  SEP IRA  -  401k  - Simple 401k -  Solo 401k  -  403b   

Account Type 3 RAET: Interest-bearing accounts.

For example ...   Health Savings Account (HSA)  -  Savings Accounts  -  CDs

***Click here to download the RAET***

PLEASE DO NOT EDIT OR POPULATE THE RAET DOCUMENT ON THIS SITE. KINDLY FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS BELOW TO DOWNLOAD TO YOUR LAPTOP OR NOTEBOOK! 

PC download: (Click on the RAET download link above ... Once opened, click on 'File' ... choose 'Download' ... click on 'Microsoft Excel' ... click on 'Open file' in Downloads pop-up ... once the RAET is opened, click on 'Enable Editing', if prompted ... click on 'File' ... click 'Save As' ... re-name your file ... save to your Desktop.)  (Follow Mac download procedures as required)

Note: Be sure to always make a backup copy of your RAET after each edit on your own device. 

Click here to view a closer look at the Retirement Account Types Our RAETs Commonly Support

RAET Endorsements and Reviews  

*  "Has been an invaluable addition to my retirement planning. Keeps me engaged almost weekly. Sometimes daily. Simple to use. Love it."  YR. 42. La Grange Park, IL

*  "Had been struggling to understand just where my financial retirement future was heading. I couldn't keep up with all of the charts and and tables. My RAET has changed all that.

One stop 'shopping' to all of my tracking needs."  TH. 56. Rockford, IL

*  "Can't think of a better way to track my retirement future than through my RAET.  Really like the Retirement Platforms $ Goals page. Yes, at-a-glance, all-at-once estimating and tracking works for me. RW. 61. Sacramento, CA

*  "Simple. simple, simple. What I like most is the ability to create different scenarios and what they might mean to my financial future. First time I've felt in control of my retirement prospects."

FG. 47. Des Moines, IA

*  "The RAET design made me more confident in understanding my retirement future. In fact, my financial planner has incorporated it in my retirement planning strategies. Seems like all those numbers now make sense in a way I can understand."  NM. 55. Chicago, IL

Happy estimating and tracking your way to a healthy financial retirement future! 

'In Good Faith' Agreement: The user of a provided RAET agrees to honor its use as theirs alone and NOT file share with others unless otherwise authorized.

Please see your tax advisor to determine to what extent, if any, your support of this initiative can convey any tax benefits or responsibilities to you.

Lifetime Wellness Empowerment Seminars

I've had the good fortune to provide a number of wellness seminars over the past several years.  As such, my presentations feature exploration of lifetime wellness topics like achieving purposeful employment and career satisfaction, financial security now and in  your retirement years, how leadership today is defined and honored facilitating personal well-being and professional growth, physiological health assessments, and review of strategies and activities designed to realize unique and creative ways to discover the promise of entrepreneurship in an environment, like today, which embraces innovation, courage and vision.

Here's a brief review of my empowerment seminars ...                                                   
1 Your Life’s Work Vision 
Provides the individual with a robust industry domain self-inventory and analysis suggesting potential employment markets suited to the individual’s career strengths, passions and search for purposeful employment. 
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Donation negotiable. 
2 Portfolio Careerism
Explores today’s need for creativity to address the ever-changing environment of employment realities. Features an in depth review of how to diversify income opportunities serving to ‘bullet-proof’ one’s career in today’s job market. 
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Donation negotiable. 
3 Pillars of Living Well 
Let’s take a look at the many faces of what living well in today’s world demands. At the heart and soul of a healthy and fulfilling life is the need to know and apply some of the key principles or ‘pillars’ known to ensure our overall wellness. 
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Donation negotiable. 
(Click here) Pillars of Living Well Menu of Topics
4 Assessing Lifetime Wellness 
When it comes to living well we are best served to explore how our current state of emotional, social, occupational, financial and physical health serve our overall wellness with the assistance of carefully constructed retirement and health assessment tools and activities. 
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Donation negotiable. 
(Click here) Assessing Lifetime Wellness Menu of Topics
5  Financial Wellness Checkup
Some Questions to consider when evaluating your preparedness today and in the future:  Do I have a healthy savings strategy? Am I financially on the right track to retire comfortably? What is my New Worth?  Why is that important to know? How can budgeting be made simple and serviceable?  And many more.
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Both Comprehensive and Simplified editions are available. Donation negotiable. 
6  Retirement Account Estimator and Tracker (RAET) - See separate post on this website for greater detail.
Confused by all those tables and pie charts provided by your retirement account website? Looking for a simple computer-based tool to estimate and track ALL of your accounts in what-if, at-a-glance, all-inclusive fashion?  

Build your confidence in following your financial retirement potential in a way never before offered. Here, we provide you with an Excel program requiring the very simplest of keyboarding skills. Add this to your strategies both you and your financial advisor can use to project and follow your retirement goals. 
Provided in the one-on-one setting or group seminar (2 hour) format, in person or virtual (Zoom). Donation negotiable. 
Are you a school, business, chamber of commerce, career center, employment agency, alumni association, church group, and the like, whose staff, clients or membership might benefit from these seminars?  I can be reached as below. I'm happy to discuss how we might collaborate.

Here are a few links to articles devoted to discussing the merits of ROI of Wellness initiatives in the workplace.

Why Wellness Programs In The Workplace Are Beneficial

What’s the Hard Return on Employee Wellness Programs?

Employee Well-Being: A New Perspective On ROI

Zoom Seminar Dates Available: All times are CST. 

SUN, ?/?, 9 AM   
SUN, ?/?, 7 PM   
TUES, ?/?, 9 AM   
THURS, ?/?, 1 PM

Past Presentations and Seminars

St Hubert’s Career Ministry, Hoffman Estates, IL.  The New Rainmakers.    

St Hubert’s Career Ministry, Arlington Hts., IL.  Assessing Lifetime Wellness.

Executive Network Group of Greater Chicago.  The New Rainmakers.

Career Transition Center of Chicago.  Your Life's Work Vision. 

Harold Washington College. Pillars of Living Well.  

WorkNet Dupage Career Center.  The New Rainmakers. 

Barrington Career Center, Barrington IL.  Your Life's Work Vision. 

DePaul University, Keynote Address, February 2010 Career Week.  Pillars of Living Well. 

Career Transition Center of Chicago.  Assessing Lifetime Wellness. 

Contact Information
Peter Willert, MS, CWP. National Wellness Institute (NWI) - Certified Wellness Practitioner 
Phone (textable):  773-230-8817
Email: pwillertcwp@gmail.com
Website: www.anuncommonwayforward.blogspot.com
Twitter - Peter.Willert
LinkedIn
Facebook
Instagram                 

JAGF Vehicle Donation Program

Donate your vehicle today!

Vehicle Donation Link! - Click here. 

Do you or anyone you know have a clunker of a car, boat, motorcycle, and the like, destined for the trash heap?  

The John Anthony George Foundation is qualified as a fully recognized 501c3 to receive such donations in support of our stated mission of serving carefully selected deserving Chicago youth education and sports opportunities and needs. Thanks for considering our appeal. 

We welcome any Qs or thoughts you may have and can best be reached at 773-230-8817.

Portfolio Careerism: More than just a gig!

         

 

Buildings that stand dozens of stories high do so because their brick and mortar reflect principles of architecture successfully put to the test. Great sports and business teams flourish with unmatched cohesion not only because their members are understandably talented, but largely because sound principles of play and execution govern their behaviors and efforts as a whole. Principles are the underpinnings of thoughtful, sustaining and respected commercial creations. So it is with a sound, productive Portfolio Careerism.

Consider the following eight themes and applications as the principle reasons why  Portfolio Career Employment (PCE) ultimately distinguishes itself among better known employment and entrepreneurial models. These core principles will be woven throughout the effort you put forth to both design and implement your PCE. Others may widely call this approach to creative employment 'gig' work. PCE is that and much more.

Let’s take a look at each to appreciate how they contribute to the innovative signature of the PCE model. 

Contractorship-Centric.  Independent contractorship is widely and successfully employed across all industries of commerce. It can be either simple or complex in structure. This contract work is grounded in remuneration for pre-specified results over a pre-specified period of  time (the term of the agreement). PCE in its execution is, fundamentally, independent contractorship. You will recall from earlier stated remarks, however, that independent contractorship is not contract employment.

Vocation-Based.  For most of the employed today, their choice for work is likely determined by their level of educational preparation, proximity to home and the supply side of the job market. Career counselors widely report that workers at any level of job satisfaction, from the disenfranchised to the highly contented, routinely express the desire to ultimately find work of their “calling”. Expect to devote substantial thought to declaring and building your PCE with vocation as a significant driver when naming your core Platforms and constructing your Platform Proficiencies.

Effort Hours.   Careful attention to ‘effort hours’ characterizes the importance of time over which we expend effort in our work. Pay per hour jobs are the measure of just that. As a PCE advocate, you will either be paid per hour or a single fee with term specifications. Again, the appeal of independent contractorship is to manage effort over time against revenue earned. For example, will you choose to accept a project promising to pay $6,000 (projected effort hours – 170) or one likely to yield $2,000 (projected effort hours – 21)? In automotive speak, your wise and efficient management of effort hours is the “governor” on your employment engine.  Ultimately, be prepared to project earnings based in part on effort hours, protective of time as a co-equal to revenue. 

Stewardship.  This certainly strikes a chord with many today seeking career satisfaction.  Made popular among various religious movements and environmental causes, stewardship widely refers to taking care of something that belongs to our at large, global family. Our PCE approach customizes stewardship to include any important or vital cause, notion or principle you deem worthy of protecting and nurturing in a commercial way.  As you go about forming proficiencies for your Stewardship Platform, keep in mind how indelible an impression this is likely to impart on others who come to appreciate your devotion to this principle. Even more, expect your declared stewardship to clearly sustain the emotional and soulful integrity of your eemployment.

Professorship.  Do you have some talent, process or idea to share that showcases an expertise? Are you willing to declare these proficiencies in way that leads and inspires? PCE Professorship does not require an advanced degree or a faculty position at a renowned university. Proudly, we all have the ability to instruct and guide. Commercially develop the gifts you have that offer solutions and strategies for all who seek their promise. This represents a unique opportunity for the type of braggadocio that will be appreciated for all its possibility to change lives and advance shared learning.      

Entrepreneurship.  Who hasn’t thought of storming to the summit of the commercial world with some impressive and creative business concept?  Imagination and uncommon vision usually precede these great efforts.  In quixotic fashion, entrepreneurs dream big and set aside trepidation in favor of what might be. The trick here is to be bold but always realistic and spot-on with goals and objectives that reflect savvy understanding of the markets in question. This is, paradoxically, not the time for unbridled whimsy. As you go about forming your PCE the matter of smart business innovation and how you interpret it through the Entrepreneurship Platform Proficiencies you create will ultimately define your adroitness for the nearly impossible and uniquely extraordinary. New thinking coupled with fresh approaches is, after all, what PCE excellence should ultimately exude.

Your Life’s Work Vision™.  Setting goals, forging strategies and planning objectives is to promote the “high fly-over” forward-thinking that is both found and expected in any successful commercial venture. The PCE devotee embraces this type of thinking as a matter fundamental to the breath and scope of enterprise design and implementation.

Set fear aside for the moment and imagine without hindrance what your commercial and vocational dream might ultimately look like. Vision has no restraints; it calls us to the outer limits of possibility. Your time for paying homage to limitation and self-doubt is ended here.     

To conclude the design side (indeed, the In Principle portion) of the your PCE, your portfolio of Core Platforms and their Platform Proficiencies will descriptively name and itemize your aptitudes, competencies, products, services and programs. In all its élan, your portfolio will become Your Life’s Work Vision™ “dressed to the nines.” Your vision and its carefully demonstrated tally of  proficiencies serve not only the commercially dedicated independent contractor but also those who may otherwise be content for now to continue on with traditional at-will employment. Only now, the path to career completeness will be buffed with a vocational polish sure to inspire.  

Portfolio Careerism

1. Contractorship-Centric: An entity of one exclusively designs and predominantly provides products and services. Routinely outsources to other contractors when demand exceeds ability to supply. Single source for control and degree of risk for performance or product quality, revenue flow, effort and expenses. State-of-the-art self employment.

2. Vocation-Based: Largely blends a model of service and product delivery defined by career experience (historical) with a greater need to express talents and personal goals when pursuing a desire for commercial self-fulfillment and -characterization.

3. Network-driven: Chiefly defines the market through personal understanding and access to demand sources through a carefully executed flow of networking around, through and with commercial “firewalls”, “gatekeepers” and “friendlies”, respectively.   Actively engages business development contractors and contracts where appropriate.

4. Customized-serviceable: Supply diverse, demand accommodating.


Conventional Employment


1. Customarily employs talent-diverse, skill specific individuals as collective entity to provide products and/or services. Rarely if ever needs to outsource to contractors. Control and degree of risk for performance quality, revenue flow, effort and expenses dependent almost exclusively upon scope of staff size, abilities and commitment.

2. Largely or almost exclusively deploys employee abilities against a purely commercial needs drive to the “bottom line”. Rarely if ever defines corporate satisfaction as measured personal effort hours saved or individual goals achieved.

3. Carefully assesses a market’s potential through achievable penetration and potential revenue yield deploying conventional mass marketing tactics and sales “demand-creation” strategies .

4. Conventional practice attracting a large, one-product, one-service-fits-all customer base.

We here at the John Anthony George Foundation provide workshops live and virtually, via Zoom, exploring Portfolio Careerism, as presented in my book, An Uncommon Way Forward (Infinity Publishing, 2009), in all its possibilities. Call or text us now at 773-230-8817 to find a time to chat about how you, or those you work with or serve, can discover these wondrous truths in search of  an exciting alternative approach to career fulfillment. 

Carpe diem, friends!

Peter Willert

What will your legacy be?

Here’s a video I compiled that I share with my college students each semester at our very last class together. I call it my 'Final Lesson' for them. It’s about 20 minutes long, so it's best viewed at your leisure, with a favorite beverage and with the assistance of your earbuds.

"You can't have a light without a dark to stick it in" - Arlo Guthrie

Cast a light somewhere today. Carpe diem, friends.

Episode 3: Voices I Remember.

Episode 3: Voices I Remember Show Notes

1. JFK – from Speech on Peace, June, 1963.  2. Maya Angelou – Voice of Peace Award – 2008. 3. Pope Francis – Address to the US Senate and House of Representatives, 2015.  4. MLK – I Have a Dream Speech, August 1963.  5. Carl Sagan – Congressional Testimony on Nutrition and Literacy – June 1994. 6. Leo Buscaglia – The Art of Being Fully Human, 1979.  7. Ted Kennedy – Eulogy for RFK, June 1968.   8. Bill Clinton – Presidential Debate, 1992.  9. Malala Sousafzai – Noble Peace Lecture, December 2014. 10. A Robin Williams Rumination.  11. Carl Sagan – Pale Blue Dot, 1997, Ballantine Books.  12. Richard Clarke – Testimony to Congress on 9/11 failure, 2004.  13. LBJ – Signs the Civil Rights Act, 1964. 14. Charles Kuralt – Commencement Speech, 1996.  15. Maya Angelou – Voice of Peace Award – 2008. 16. RFK – Speech on MLK Assassination, April 1968. 17.  Ronald Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate.  18. Studs Terkel – On Race and Work, 1997.  19. JFK – Speech on Race to the Moon, September 1962.  20. Severn Suzuki – Speaking at the UN Earth Summit, 1992.  21. Carl Sagan – Pale Blue Dot, 1997, Ballantine Books.  22. Barak Obama - Announcing the capture of OBL, May, 2011.  23. David McCullough – Commencement Speech, 2009.  24.  Charles Kuralt – Commencement Speech, 1996.  25. John Lewis – Addressing the US House of Representatives on ending 14 years of war. 2015.  26. Mother Teresa – Noble Peace Prize Address, 1979.  27. Barak Obama – Presidential Victory Speech, 2008. 28. The West Wing – Bible Lesson Episode.  29.  Carl Sagan – Pale Blue Dot, 1997, Ballantine Books.  30.  Charles Kuralt – Commencement Speech, 1996.

For more on AUWF workshops, lectures, mentorships or to suggest a podcast topic or guest contributor you would like to recommend for our program, kindly email us at: breakout@ai-ltd.net, or call/text us at: 773-230-8817.

All oral and written comments heard or posted on AUWF podcasts are the views of their respective authors, whether host or podcast participant. All content on this podcast is for informational purposes only.  The host of this podcast makes no representations as to the accuracy or completeness of any information offered by its participants.  AUWF does not endorse any product or service participants may represent or recommend.  Those exhibiting  profane, hateful or disrespectful speech or views will be muted from the program. AUWF podcasts may be recorded and replayed in their entirety at the discretion of its owner. 

Return to Gethsemane

All along life's road back home we are faced with both monumental and quite ordinary moments requiring our engagement. How shall we respond? Simply put, we either stand and watch, or we commit to a response.

Beginning from the mid-1800s a rural to urban style transformation raged at many locations surrounding the outskirts of Chicago, particularly south of the city. The story of how this transformation found a now-famous caretaker in the person of Arnold Damen SJ is compelling if not for the considerable contradictions that seemed to characterize his commitment to assuring the dignity of life for immigrant Irish, Germans, Italians, Polish and Russians. Aside from providing for the spiritual and basic economic needs of an evolving community, Fr Damen expressed his dedication to its growth largely through a commitment to educational excellence. Even when faced with perilous shortages of life's most essential requirements - safe housing and adequate food and health resources - an education in both the classic sense and as expressed to meet the demands of life in the here and now, for all its challenges, accomplishments and disappointments, did not waiver.

Today, facing Roosevelt Road on Chicago's near southside a statue of Arnold Damen, SJ occupies the front lawn of St Ignatius College Prep (which adjoins his early faith and social community gathering nexus - Holy Family Parish Church). Service, Justice, Education, Faith: a compendium for all those who live out a commitment to different thinking, action not complicity, and outrage at social, political and moral transgressions.

... "The truth of the matter is the justice at stake. Every person has their Gethsemane. At any such pivotal point in one's personal history, with a heightened consciousness for the underserved or vilified among our family of man, who among us will be found asleep? Or who shall by the grace of their convictions be seen and heard, fully alive, compelled to do the right thing?" ...

Breakout with Portfolio Career Employment Principles and Strategies

What evidence can suggest that a single military operation called a "breakout” at any time or at any place in history can so compel the pace and result of a larger conflict, except that retrospection tells us otherwise, or that for many reliving an event renders it immutable as life-defining and life-directing?

What has this to do with choosing Avranches, France as a place to which we can assign, at least geographically, the very nature of Portfolio Career Employment promise, wonder and purpose?

 

                     August 1, 1944 – Avranches, France

A Europe at war found itself here "symbolically” if not technically deadlocked in the early weeks following the Allied invasion of Normandy. The successful military breakout conducted by General George Patton’s Third Army has by many accounts been assigned almost mythical status as having shortened the course of the war in Europe, thus literally saving tens of thousands of lives, on both sides. The sacrifices made by our “Greatest Generation” there (indeed, at countless other places of “ultimate sacrifice”), both in lives lost and brave efforts too staggering in number to count, often bring many of us to reflect if only as a simple measure of our gratitude. What is left but to remember, tell their stories, preserve their heroism? They are leaving us moment by moment in ever growing numbers.

Today, Portfolio Career Employment (PCE) principles and strategies remember the essence of that monumental event. PCE signals its dedication to the legacy of those participants. In the content and methodologies of such work it seeks to inspire those deadlocked in social and cultural dissonance, or steeped in uncertainty about how to express their dreams and personal goals through their life’s work, or adrift in frustration over understanding challenges to their health and well-being. Perhaps there are those who seek only simple improvement in matters of practical living. And what for those who strive for the fullest satisfaction only a "the road less traveled" can bring? To "breakout" personally, socially, professionally, intellectually, whether for self-gratification or excellence in career development, is to virtually gaze from a bluff overlooking a small French town and be reminded that effort brings honor, vision compels creativity and courage is not daunting when accompanied by hope.