Mississippi River Challenge Event Manager

Member of FMR staff since: March 2005

Duties: Coordinates and manages all aspects of FMR’s annual Mississippi River Challenge, which raised over $92,000 and put 306 paddlers on the river (a 42% increase over the previous year) last August. This year’s Challenge is August 4 and 5.

Education: International Studies & French — College of St. Thomas

Professional experience: Minnesota House of Representatives, legislative work; Human Rights work in Guatemala; Adult Education and Community-building program with immigrants; Educational Programming at the Resource Center for the Americas.

FMR accomplishment most proud of: Besides surviving the 2006 Challenge, the introduction of Personal Fundraising Pages to the Challenge as well as converting the brochure from a traditional format to a newspaper-style.

Lives: In Minneapolis, two blocks from the river.

Grew up in: Ellsworth, Wisconsin (Cheese Curd capital of the nation!)

Quote: “It’s important to me to work for a cause that I’m passionate about, like the river. I couldn’t work for something I didn’t have a passion for.”

Hobbies: Anything related to Guatemala, knitting, gardening, cooking or biking.

Favorite book: A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

Last book she read that she really loved: Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

Favorite musicians: Kate Wolf, John McCutcheon, Brandi Carlisle.

Favorite location on the river: The path with a waterfall below the monument on East Mississippi River Blvd.

Last big vacation: France, fall 2006, back to visit the family with whom she lived, and the town where she studied 19 years before.

Conservation/environmental heroes: Tom Benevento and Angie Larson Beckett

Something most people don’t know about her: “I sat on a bus with Peter Jennings for 3 hours when I was 19 and told him my life story.”