Global Youth for Education and Change (GYEC)

11/02/2025

The philosopher Bertrand Russell made this claim 93 years ago. Seven years later, humanity faced the emergence of the Second World War.

The conflicts of today are both vastly different and eerily familiar. And the vital need he urges us to consider is more resonant than ever.

What have you found to be promising ways to cultivate a vivid sense of global citizenship?

10/29/2025

What does the design of a park bench tell us about ourselves and our cities?

https://youtube.com/shorts/KB8RWULtiQc?si=C-P6Os1suiimOdV3

In less than three minutes, NYT reporter, Anna Kodé, offers a brief history of the New York City park bench. Its evolution reveals a shift from icon of the public square to emblem of “hostile architecture.” More than anything, it’s a reminder that design has both form and function.

**What should be the purpose of public design in our cities today?**

06/26/2024

We're back! And we've built a new program we want to share with you. - https://mailchi.mp/72e2c4406e55/were-back-and-weve-built-a-new-program-we-want-to-share-with-you

10/29/2019

This Mail & Guardian article describes what our interns do every day. Inquiry. Engagement. Innovation. These are evidence of our work being done.

https://zcu.io/ZKLa

If they want to change the world, social innovators must first transform themselves, argue academics from the UCT Graduate School of Business

09/27/2019

Stay tuned for more.

03/20/2019

We keep returning to this op-doc from The New York Times highlighting the importance of telling the full story of we admire. Bayard Rustin's Quaker values rooted him in an uncompromising understanding of his identity, not as a black person or a gay person, but as a member of the human family. And he used those values to make stand after stand against injustice. It is this type of our children and need to combat the destructive forces determined to keep us apart even though, as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. so clearly illuminated years ago, we're all "caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny." This mutuality and interconnectedness is our reality. While we have the choice to accept or deny it, Bayard Rustin's life is a reflection of the possibilities—the creative and constructive forces we can contribute to, the capacities and human flourishing that can come about— that are revealed to us when we use to animate our thought and actions toward the building of a more just, vibrant, and peaceful world.

(link: https://bit.ly/2TO8X4q) bit.ly/2TO8X4q

Bayard Rustin was a chief organizer of the 1963 March on Washington and thought reparations, and even separate African-American studies departments, were a b...

03/19/2019

Since their founding, our partners in South Africa (Vumundzuku-bya Vana: Our Children's Future) have used portable add-ons, or manufactured buildings, to house the center's activities. And they've always kept them whimsical! :) It's nice to know they're not alone. Even better is the research that a creative, arts-filled space in a place where children and youth are most attracted to the process of learning and advancing their understanding of the world together.

Come for the giant wave library. Stay for the funhouse mirror slide.

03/12/2019

For all our aspiring agents of change, Anand Giridharadas's writing and thoughts are worth paying attention to. Check out his recent intellectual contributions to Harvard's Social Enterprise Conference.

Speaking at the opening plenary of Harvard University’s 20th annual social enterprise conference, author and social critic Anand Giridharadas called for jettisoning impact rhetoric and placing our energy instead into social movements, political activism, and structural change.

03/07/2019

In thinking about our mission (i.e., to connect youth to each other and to their purpose) this morning, I couldn't help but consider these words by the philosopher, mathematician, historian, and Nobel laureate, Bertrand Russell. I've been reading his thoughts on education, but his wisdom on a well-lived life is also resonant.

What do you think about his metaphor? Should we see our lives as rivers?

02/05/2019

I'm working on a project with the Center for Service-Learning and Civic Engagement at Michigan State University, and I came across this quote from John W. Gardner. It seems to align with GYEC's outlook on education:

"We don't even know what skills may be needed in the years ahead. That is why we must train our young people in the fundamental fields of knowledge, and equip them to understand and cope with change. That is why we must give them the critical qualities of mind and durable qualities of character that will serve them in circumstances we cannot now even predict."

01/31/2019

Here at GYEC, we've been reading Anand Giridharadas's book, Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World. And this morning I read a blog post by Harvard Business School professor, Mark R. Kramer. In it, he talks about "the competitive advantage [of] social impact." Our organization's work with the concept of purpose has me wondering when we will move our simple-minded measurement of success by its earning potential to an individual and collective mindset in which we do what is right, even if it means leaving money on the table.

I'm curious to hear your thoughts. Please share.

What his critics are missing.

01/29/2019

There are 4.6 million youth in the U.S. who are neither working nor in school. This new report from the Aspen Institute explores how three programs—in the Bay Area, Philadelphia, and Northern California—are engaging youth in entrepreneurial endeavors as a pathway toward prosperity. Such prosperity, we believe, can only be achieved if youth see their individual advancement aligned with the betterment and well-being of their communities. We're excited to hear what this report has to say.

As opportunity youth continue to struggle to connect to the economy, entrepreneurship offers a chance for them to learn the skills and mindset needed to thrive in today’s economy. Opportunity youth, the 4.6 million young people who are neither in work nor in school, often encounter significant bar...