Really Long Post on a Rather Important Subject

No, we didn't create a special "Class of 2020 Cheese Futures" logo to tell you about an up-and-coming first grader with insane ups who's a can't-miss D1 prospect.

It's not that at all.

Today is Blog Action Day 2008, a day when roughly 9,000 bloggers and nearly 10 million readers around the world are focusing on a single topic: Poverty.

So what's with the year 2020? Well, one state group has placed that year squarely in its sights. Vision 2020's mission is to eliminate child poverty in Wisconsin by 2020. Here are some interesting items we found on their site:

• Recent census bureau data about poverty in Wisconsin
• A list of organizations that have joined the campaign, including Carthage College, the Eau Claire Area School District and MATC
• A map that shows county-by-county poverty stats
  

Please understand: The purpose of this post is not to push one initiative over another. We're not qualified to speak on such matters. Some are government-led. Others are faith-based. Still others are neither government-led nor faith-based.

The point of this post is to encourage all of us to think seriously about poverty in Wisconsin and learn all we can about it. Then take the path you feel will best help solve the problem of poverty, perhaps even by the time today's first graders would be graduating from high school.

So yes, the seeding for the state tournament will be out soon (we can't wait, either). And yes, it will all be very thrilling. But between now and all that hoopla, please take a look at some of the links above (or google some of your own) and learn more about poverty in Wisconsin.

Cheese & Volleyball also plans to donate $1.00 to the Feed My People Food Bank of Northwestern Wisconsin for every comment made on this post today. But the rules for how comments have to appear will be even stricter than usual. We're looking for the names (and only the names) of the high schools you think will win state championships this year in the four respective girls divisions. We've included the first comment to show you exactly how we want yours to appear (for what it's worth, we picked the same teams we did in our January 1, 2008 post).

Please note: Just the four predicted winners. No commentary whatsoever. Not about the tournament. Not even about the topic. That's because we want this to be an exercise in showing support for this cause. (That and we'll be able to find out who everyone thinks will win state championships.)

Thanks for your patience. We now return this blog to the topic of volleyball in Wisconsin.