This unfolding story is the type of good news we all need to hear. No one enjoys reading stories of AIDS orphans in Africa. It hurts to hear of a nine year old struggling to care for his younger siblings but it is the situation which has given birth to this good news story

In the face of lackluster public education, even poor families turn to private education. By scrimping and saving, many can afford “cheap” private school—and this is often the only way to obtain a quality education. In fact, private schools flourish in rural or low-income areas. The World Absenteeism Survey found that they were more likely found in villages in India where the public system was lacking.

2011 has been an exciting year for the Rise Team....

The Mercado serves a neighborhood that has been through hard times. The Chamizal, as the neighborhood is known, never recovered from the shift of the clothing factories to Mexico (and later China) with the advent of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994. Many of the women who worked in the industry lost their jobs and families are still struggling.

Premlata Poonia grew up among big dreams. Her father was an educator at a government school who dreamt of transforming rural India through education. He insisted that she receive the best education available. But as part of a farming family with deep rural roots, that education did not come without sacrifice.

The technological breakthroughs of the Green Revolution in the 60s and 70s sprang us forward. But our growth has slowed. Agricultural growth has missed targets by 1 percentage point for the past 4 years, and the combination of economic growth with a swelling population means more people are demanding more agricultural commodities.

The Greenagers have only just started their movement. But what’s heartening is that in an environment where careers, MBAs, scholarships and pay packages dominate the conversation, a group of young students are seeking to walk down a different path.