The main feature of last week’s New York Times Magazine was “D.I.Y. Foreign-Aid Revoltion” by Nicholas Kristof. The essay profiles some amazing young women (it was the Women’s Empowerment issue – check out the short Q&A with Melinda Gates) who are relentlessly pursuing projects that are improving lives across the developing world. Each of the projects and their founders are remarkable for their passion and their innovation, but two stood out as I dug deeper into each organization.
On one hand we have Maggie Doyne – who after graduating from high school set out to travel the world and ended up starting The BlinkNow Foundation and the Kopila Valley Children’s Home and School in Nepal. On the other is Elizabeth Schrapf – a Harvard MBA and founder of Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE). Her plan is to franchise women owned factories to produce sanitary pads (with local materials and labor) that will keep girls from missing school and women from missing work due to lack of basic health products.
Maggie Doyne’s commitment to sheltering and educating children in extreme poverty pretty much defines the power of youthful energy. Her achievements to date, as a 23 year old, are humbling to say the least. Below, you can hear her story first hand in a talk given in September as part of The DO Lectures.
While Maggie’s story is emotional and inspiring for her achievements as a young person with no formal training, Elizabeth Scharpf is at the other end of the specturm: Her experience as a creative professional and a number crunching strategist has led her to discover a potentially pattern changing innovation that makes so much sense it hurts your brain to think that no one has effectively addressed this basic need. Watch a talk by Elizabeth at last year’s The Feast Conference
Maggie Doyne and Elizabeth Scharpf represent the some of the best outcomes of youth energy and formal education. When you combine the two, you can begin to imagine a world where seemingly intractable social problems will be solved by a new generation, trained and empowered through service and social innovation.
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