• Days since my release from 26 years in prison: 123
• Miles run today: 13.6
• Miles run this week: 49.4
• Miles run during the calendar month: 69.4
• Marathon distances completed: 12
• Weight: 165

Journal of activities:

 

My partner Justin and I enjoy many exciting developments with our Straight-A Guide Life Skills Program. Facilitators in different schools, prisons, and jails are using the 50-hour curriculum to teach people from at-risk populations. Our program includes 10 modules that show individuals the importance of making values-based, goal-oriented decisions. Over the past several years, however, scholars have been emphasizing the need for evidence-based programs. Only 123 days have passed since my release from 26 years, so Justin and I lacked the resources of other organizations that develop life skills program. We bootstrapped ours, but we’re confident that facilitators who teach the Straight-A Guide will find enormous value. Not only does our program prepare participants for law-abiding, contributing lives, but it also helps them develop the character necessary to reject criminal lifestyles and associates.

I’m really enthusiastic about discussions I’ve opened with two social scientists who are expressing an interest in evaluating our Straight-A Guide Life Skills Program. I would work with the researchers to develop the data collection instruments, and they would independently analyze whether our program truly succeeds in preparing offenders for law-abiding, contributing lives. I’m looking forward to these developments in 2014.

Today I spent many hours writing the preliminary descriptions of our program for those who need to understand it. I also worked with my friend Tulio Cardozo to develop my website further. We installed some plugins that blast our all of my posts to the social media, which is pretty cool. It allows me to publish in one area and watch the work sent out to social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+.

I’m still using my iPhone to record my running. In order to reach my goal of 13 marathons this year, I need to run one more. Perhaps I’ll run the long distance next weekend. I have too much work to complete this weekend.