All Change Agent
- Commuter travels 70 miles each day...on foot
In order to support his family, Steve Simoff walks 35 miles from his home in Davis City, Mo. to his job at Lakeside Casino in Osceola, Iowa.
- Lady Gaga jumps into a lake: Charitable giving or celeb self-promotion?
Celebrity involvement can help catapult a charitable cause to global awareness and draw in millions of dollars in fundraising. But is there a line between charity and self-promotion?
- What a town in Uganda teaches about ending aid dependency
In Iganga, Uganda, the community group Musana has changed its model from dependency on outsiders to local initiative.
- Community groups help save Kenya's vital 'water towers'
Kenya’s high-elevation forests are the source for most of its water. A new conservation strategy of working with local communities is showing signs of success.
- Can women farm owners prevent the next Dust Bowl?
Members of Women Caring for the Land plant cover crops, install buffer strips, restore wetlands, and plant native wildflowers for pollinator habitat.
- Could produce on wheels help eliminate America’s food deserts?
Amelia Pape launched My Street Grocery, a mobile grocery truck, to bring better food to communities that lack their own supermarkets.
- A quest to end hunger among coffee growers
A group of coffee companies has formed the Coalition for Coffee Communities to help eliminate hunger in coffee-growing communities around the world.
- Ex-child soldiers in Colombia face their tormentors
Rebels, paramilitaries, and criminal gangs have forcibly recruited thousands of children and teens. Now a reconciliation effort is laying the groundwork for peace through face-to-face apologies to the youths.
- 'Pop up' efforts send thousands of kids to see ‘Selma’ for free
In New York and across the country, adults are forming spontaneous groups to make sure students see the movie 'Selma,' which chronicles the civil rights protests that led to the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
- In Afghanistan, teaching men that education is not a threat
Sakena Yacoobi started the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL) to educate young girls. Then young boys started asking if she could teach them too.
- Four projects that zero in on four big world problems
The $42.3 billion Gates Foundation is looking to achieve four monumental goals by 2030. Here are four entrepreneurs already working on solutions.
- In Haiti, a library with no books transforms the way kids learn
A library of digital books could eventually bring thousands of titles to millions of students around the world.
- Women in India fight sexual harassment with smartphones
Interest in phone apps with SOS buttons to alert contacts and websites to report sexual harassment has surged as more women challenge the view that they have a lower status than men.
- A passionate 25-year-old builds a charity for Cambodia
Kenny King created Global ADE, which has already built schools in several communities in Cambodia.
- Private funds spark a ‘Golden Age’ for public parks
In roughly half of major US cities nonprofits raise money to fund public parks, led by New York's Central Park Conservancy, which has provided more than $700 million since 1980.
- Solar 'generators' power up remote African homes, factories
In Tanzania more than 840 households and small factories have been connected to solar grid systems, bringing electricity to a remote region.
- The road to more income in Uganda? Owning a motorcycle.
In the capital of Kampala, Uganda, a local business called Tugende is doubling profits for taxi bike drivers through its lease-to-own program.
- #ShovelItForward: Kindness crossing borders?
In a show of winter warmth, young people as far as Connecticut and Canada are turning the hashtag into action by helping others clear their driveways of snow.
- 'Climate smart' farming tackles challenges of a warming world
With temperatures rising and extreme weather becoming more frequent, 'climate-smart agriculture' is using a host of measures — from new planting practices to improved water management — to keep farmers ahead of climate change.
- These graduates are primed to reduce world hunger
African Plant Breeding Academy students aim to introduce overlooked crops to African communities in need.