Life lessons from a 100-mile run through an Indian desert

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Over the past five days, 18-year-old Canadian Emma Cook-Clarke and three other young people from India and the United States have run more than 100 miles through the Thar Desert, a seemingly endless, sweltering stretch in northwest India.

Except for the occasional passing camel herd, grazing water buffalo, groups of surprised children, and huge horn-squelching trucks, the route is monotonous.

To do a more thorough job reporting on the feat, this reporter decided to join the run. It's my first day and I lag a quarter mile behind. Only 10 miles in, I already want to quit. Though I'm an experienced ultramarathon runner, this is one of the most difficult terrains I have ever traversed. It's hot, flat, and seems to go on forever.

A decade older than Ms. Cook-Clarke, a recent high school graduate, I wonder how, at such a young age, she has the drive to keep going. But then I realize what propels her. This is much more than a run. It's an expedition with a purpose. Her role as a youth ambassador, one of four who were selected for the expedition, is to reach beyond her perceived limits and use adventure as a medium to educate, inspire, and empower.

While budgets for education are being cut across the US and Canada, this innovative program called impossible2Possible (i2P) offers learning tools free of charge to any school that signs up, exemplifying where education is headed in the 21st century.

Unlike many of the virtual classrooms that have popped up across the US in the past five years, i2P does not rely on government funding and is touted for being interactive. The organization gets most of its money from corporate sponsors such as Gatorade and relies on donations from Apple and BGAN Satellite for its technology. Called "21st century learning" and "truly groundbreaking" by Apple's Distinguished Educators, a program that recognizes K-12 and higher education pioneers who use Apple products to transform teaching and learning, i2P is already being recognized for its unique approach.

Tears stream down Cook-Clarke's face as she runs toward the aid station, a white sport utility vehicle at the side of the road. "I'm fine," she says as she wipes her face and takes a big gulp of Gatorade. But judging from the limp in her left leg, she's not fine.

Her fellow youth ambassador Jessica Kenny, an American nursing student at Lake Erie College in Ohio, points a hand-held camera at her.

"How are you doing right now, Emma?" Ms. Kenny asks. Normally, this would be incredibly annoying, but sharing struggles is part of what i2P is about. In a few hours this video will be broadcast to hundreds of schools across the US and Canada, and several in India and Europe.

Bringing the world to the classroom

Ray Zahab, a world-renowned adventurer and founder of i2P, says the vision of the organization is to "use adventure to encourage a generation of leaders whose direct experiences and education will prepare them to lead social and environmental action all across the world." The program, he says, tries to do this by "using the concepts of experimental- and challenge-based learning to create curriculum that will engage students and teachers like Adriana Rossi."

Ms. Rossi, a seventh-grade teacher who uses the i2P videos in her class and has attended two i2P expeditions, including the trip to India, says this kind of out-of-the box learning could make a lasting difference.

The ability to visually follow youth ambassadors as they visit local hospitals in India and interact with children in the villages they run through, she says, gives participants a richer understanding.

"To be able to communicate live with these ambassadors in a place that most kids are not able to travel to is phenomenal, and it makes it real for them," Rossi says. "So, when they are learning, they are getting excited about it."

This is exactly what Mr. Zahab had in mind when he started the program. "We believe that integrating technologies and using them in ways that are entertaining, educational, and informative is the landscape of the future for education," he says.

In 2007, Zahab himself ran 50 miles a day for 111 days across the Sahara desert. The run was documented in the film "Running the Sahara," produced and narrated by Matt Damon, and designed to raise awareness of water issues in the Sahara.