Exciting News!
I got a dream 1-month job. I’m absolutely thrilled to have gotten a job offer to work with the national non-profit Active Minds.
This isn’t your normal desk job, of course; no, this is pretty much the opposite. I’ll be working for a month on the road in California! At college campuses and public areas from San Francisco down to L.A., I’ll be working to change the dialogue on mental health. Specifically, I’ll be one of two road staffers working on a tour called Send Silence Packing. Send Silence Packing, or SSP, is the largest program of Active Minds, and this will be the 3rd tour project of theirs. I’ll be traveling with my tour partner (and pretty cool dude–read about the projects he’s working on here) Brandon, as well as the occasional staff memeber from Active Minds’s D.C. headquarters. You can check out the Road Staff section of SSP’s website to learn more, and I’d be so happy for you to follow the blog! We’ll soon be posting photos, video, and daily happenings.
Besides touring and display work, I’ll be writing daily blog posts on ssp.org, taking photos, interviewing attendees, filming and editing videos, speaking with the media, and more. We’ll be representing Active Minds on this project, and I couldn’t be more excited to work on such a great project that utilizes so much of my work experience.
This project works to change the dialogue on mental health. By working with their 350+ national chapters, they act as a necessary resource, trying to erase the stigma associated with mental health and suicide. This is a grave issue effecting 1,100 students per year in the U.S. We can all help prevent suicide by just talking about mental health and suicide–that is, speaking to friends and family, expressing concern, using free college counseling center resources, and not being afraid to talk about this important issue.
To demonstrate our point, we’ll be taking 1,100 backpacks on the road. All have been donated by supporters, and hundreds are the actual backpacks of lost ones. They have heartbreaking stories attached, and some still have posessions inside. These stories remind us all that the 1,100 student lives lost to suicide annually. isn’t just a statistic, but our brothers, daughters, friends, and loved ones. These lives CAN be prevented.
On a happier note, this job will mean a lot to me, and to be working with the terrific staff at Active Minds makes it even better. Why am I so excited about this opportunity? First off, I’ll be doing meaningful work. Psych was one of my majors in college, and I worked for a year with my school’s mental health and counseling center, concentrating on mental health and suicide analysis with local and national data. I did presentations and spoke to quite a few students about it, so I’m quite familiar with the area! Second, for years I’ve been searching for a kind of on-the-road job. I can see differen tplaces, meet different kinds of people, and explore on the side. Selfish? Crazy? Other people enjoy stability and peace of mind. I enjoy the unknown, and that means that I’ll be in a healthier state of mind to work, giving everyone better results. And third, how many times can I say that spontaneous trips, living on the road, camping with strangers, and having adventures has helped me get a job?
Today starts a new, wonderful adventure.
antitouristtraveler.com 
Sounds great Coop!
I must admit, I did a double take when I read the stetnmeat. It doesn\’t do the economics profession any good to see analysis like this (yes, I\’m an economist).TBH, I think I know the guy in charge at Kenanga – he\’s a nice guy, but I don\’t think he\’s experienced enough or has the required academic credentials.For that matter, I\’ve never trusted broker reports on economics or the market – the probability is too high of \”capture\” i.e. lack of independence from the sales side of broker firms.Jasonred79: The loss of reserves can be directly attributed to the withdrawal of portfolio funds in 3Q (RM50 billion plus) and 4Q (my guesstimate at RM70 billion plus). Also, the impact of net exports (i.e. exports-imports) on GDP growth is actually fairly minor. The main channel for the slowdown in growth came as exporters responded to the fall in demand by cutting production and investment (falling gross capital formation in the national accounts), as well as a sharp slowdown in consumption as both companies and consumers reacted to the bad news.I think the key thing that misled most analysts and the government was that exports held up despite manufactured exports being essentially dead since mid-2006. Export income was only supported by the commodity bubble, which went bust after July 2008.Datuk: Please don\’t tar all of us with the same brush. Many economists that I know were expecting a downturn in 2008, but we expected the bust to emanate from China, not the US. Secondly, the speed of the collapse in the global economy is unprecedented.Salvatore_Dali: The Petronas idea is good and would probably be cheaper for the government, but won\’t make much difference in terms of the impact on the money supply. It still requires a withdrawal of funds from the banking system to the government, and may force BNM to inject further liquidity into the market to maintain the current monetary policy stance.
We’ve arrived at the end of the line and I have what I need!