Blog brings basketball star home
(taken from the November 25, 2006 St. Albert Gazette)
By Kevin Ma
Staff Writer		    

There was no lift down to the gym when Jennifer Krempien went to Robert Rundle Elementary School and the word "blog" hadn't even been invented yet.Jennifer Krempien

Now there's a lift ready for her and a horde of Grade 1 students to chat with over the Internet.

Krempien, three-time Paralympic gold medallist and co-captain of Canada's national women's wheelchair basketball team, is corresponding with students at the school as part of an effort to teach the kids about disabilities.

The idea for the blog came from several people, said school principal John Osgood.

"I've know the Krempiens for a long time," he said, adding he worked with Krempien as a coach.

The school was also looking for a globe-trotting athlete to talk to students about her travels. Krempien is sister-in-law to kindergarten teacher Christine Ferguson and had visited her class last year. The school hatched a plan to have those Kids (now in Grade 1) ask Krempien questions via a blog, an online journal, with Grade 5 students acting as typesetters.

"It's a great way to give back to the school I went to," said Krempien, who attended Rundle for Grades 1 to 3.

The students have had one question and answer session with Krempien, said teacher Louisa Jans, and plan to hold one every two weeks. "Some of my students have been checking [the blog] at home," she said.

Scared
Grade 5 student Ashley Devenney was one of the many students to send in a question. "I wasn't sure if I would get a response sooner or later," she said, "so I'm really anxious to see what she wrote,"

Krempien actually responded almost immediately to the questions, despite being busy with a tournament in Alabama. "Lots of them were hilarious," she said, such as the one that asked if she had over a million dollars.("Oh, heck no!" she replied.)

One of the more thought-provoking ones, she said, asked her what it felt like when she became disabled due to a rare condition called arteriovenous malformation (where malformed blood vessels bleed, like in a stroke).

She doesn't remember much from that time she wrote in the blog. "I remember being scared in the hospital because I didn't understand what was happening and why I couldn't walk anymore."

She doesn't recall feeling left out at school, she said in an interview, although she did have to go outside and down a hill to get into the gym. She credits her teachers and parents for raising her just like any other kid. "It wasn't an option for me not to go to school and contribute in some way."

Starting wheelchair basketball at age nine, Krempien was selected to join the national basketball team at 17. Today, at 31, she holds four Paralympic medals and four world championships and is working as a dietitian in B.C.

Krempien said she's thinking of retiring from wheelchair basketball in a couple of years, but will definitely go to the 2008 Paralympic Games before that happens. She will probably finish her master's in human nutrition, she said. She also hopes to visit the school this spring to demonstrate wheelchair basketball.

Devenney said she's eager to give it a try. "It's probably going to be a real challenge to dribble the ball and push the chair at the same time."

Schools seem more aware of disabilities nowadays, Krempien said, a change she attributes to education and exposure brought a bout by role models like Rick Hansen and Terry Fox.

Devenney said that Krempien was amazing and didn't let anything hold her back. "We're really not so different except for being in a wheelchair. We're still all just people."

Krempien's blog can be read at www.jenkrempien.com
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