Former Terp, Current Minnesota Vikings DB, Madieu Williams, On a Goodwill Mission

Madieu Williams continues to make us proud!!! He and a cohort from the School of Public Health are in Freetown, Sierra Leone, Madieu's hometown, and where Madieu has established a school in honor of his mother, Abigail Burscher. You can see Madieu, back row, second from the left, with the school administration and members of the travel party. Here is an excerpt from the journal of Dr. Woodie Kessel, pediatrician, (front row, second from the left) about the school visit.

It took 2.5 to 3 hours to get to Madieu’s school. Most of the travel was paved potholed roads except for the last half hour of rough unpaved rocky road. We drove by some very poor housing albeit with space between the homes unlike in most other parts of Freetown. Since everything here is so poor it is hard todistinguish from poor, real poor, and unbelievably poor. We arrived at Madieu’s school and we were as you might expect VERY warmly received, especially Madieu. We met the Head Master, school staff, and the teachers and peaked into each of three classrooms. In classroom 1 the lesson was a secular version of “In the Beginning” – on day 1 G-d created light…; in class room 2 the lesson was addition and subtraction; and in class room 3 it was multiplication. Class 2 and 3 welcomed us with songs and dancing. We then went to the Headmaster’s office for the Friendship agreement signing and instruction of bracelet crafting. Madieu and I spoke briefly and took many photos. We presented them ALL with hats from Bob and the UMD SoPH thanks to Gloria (and the SPH Alumni Association).

March 4th - News from the MGN

Congratulations

Former Terps Bruce Campbell and Nolan Carroll were at the 2010 NFL Scouting Combine this past weekend. Nolan was not able to go through drills yet, but was able to take part in the rest of the weekend. Bruce solidified himself as one of the top offensive lineman with his performance and his results are as follows:

40 Yard Dash- 4.85 seconds (1)

225 on Bench- 34 reps (5)

Vertical- 32.0” (6)

3 Cone Drill- 7.58 seconds (8)

20 Yard Shuttle- 4.69 seconds (10)

*The number in parentheses was his rank among offensive lineman

The link below is a video of Bruce’s interview on the set of the NFL Network at the combine. http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-combine/09000d5d816a0c34/Bruce-Campbell-on-set

The link below is an article on Bruce from the Washington Post.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/terrapins-insider/2010/02/bruce_campbell_not_worried_abo.html

Countdown

21 days until the first Spring Practice. In addition to the student-athletes normal workout schedule, they have only one more winter workout this Friday morning.

Introduction

Here is a little bit about Kevin Threlkel. Kevin will be assisting with the MGN and Football Operations. He comes to us from Kansas State University with a Bachelor’s degree in Business Management and Master’s in College Student Personnel in Athletics. While at Kansas State, he was a student coach for the football team for three years and assisted with the offense and recruiting. Kevin was also a graduate assistant in the development office in Kansas State Athletic Department.

All future weekly updates will come from Kevin and if you have any questions or ideas, please contact him at

301-314-9374 or threlkel@umd.edu.