Blogs

Last Friday, YueYue, the toddler that was run over twice in China and ignored by 18 passersby, died from her injuries. The incident was caught on closed circuit camera, and the online video of YueYue lying bleeding in a gutter while pedestrians and bikers swerved to avoid her went viral and garnered over 1.5 million views on Youku video, a popular video sharing site.  

 

Nationwide, newspapers and online communities have continued to discuss how such horrifying inaction might reflect a deeper cultural problem in China. While many Internet commentators have pointed to the possibility that in China, ethics have been left behind in the wake of economic development and urbanization, I think there’s more to the issue.

Countries around the world are facing a common crisis: the lack of accessible and affordable health care. 

 

Nations everywhere are facing severe challenges, including fragmented health care ecosystems, high costs, inconsistent quality of care, inefficient systems, and barriers to access. These surprisingly similar obstacles to accessible and affordable health care exist across borders – and so should their solutions.  

 

To catalyze these solutions, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Pioneer Portfolio is partnering with Ashoka Changemakers to launch a new competition: Innovations for Health: Solutions that Cross Borders.

All parents want a bright future for their kids. Which is why this history major, French-poetry minor, writer mom wants her kids to ditch the artsy, literary track I once held as the height of achievement and make stuff. Invent, design, discover, and build actual things.

 

This surprising revelation is rooted in my vague understanding that the fields that are growing in this country are in science, technology, engineering, and math -- the STEM fields. And our country needs STEM experts to thrive. And, unlike the field of writing, there's money and stability in STEM careers.

 

I have been talking, mostly seriously, about wanting my kids to make stuff for a while, but suddenly I've got a child who is old enough to begin making decisions about her future -- and the future she sees for herself is in STEM. So I, like our whole country, need a serious attitude adjustment.

 

In this Ashoka Changemakers interview, Lila Ibrahim, an internationally-recognized leader in the field of engineering and business, discusses how she encourages women to become technologists, and how to build successful private-sector partnerships that strengthen science, technology, education, and math (STEM) learning in schools. 

 

Ibrahim is a partner of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), a leading venture capital firm in Silicon Valley. Before joining KPCB, Ibrahim had a diverse 18-year career with Intel Corp, where she led the startup business of Intel's Emerging Markets Product Group, as well as Intel’s Digital Village Initiative, which delivered technology projects to advance entrepreneurship, health, education, and e-governance all over the world. Ibrahim was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and was featured on the cover of ForbesWoman (2009) for her role in promoting women in technology.

 

During the past decade, Ibrahim has established and sustained three computer labs at the orphanage in Lebanon where her father was raised. She earned her bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Purdue University, where she continues to guest lecture. 

Just 17 years ago, civil war in Rwanda culminated in a horrific 100-day genocide that killed between 800,000 and 1,000,000 citizens. Today, however, the country is making notable strides towards the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals, and against all odds has doubled the life expectancy of its citizens. Despite the scars left by decades of violence, Rwanda’s story is changing into one of hope and pragmatic determination at the local and national level.

 

Through an ambitious set of health reforms, the country is saving the lives of children and mothers. The backbone of Rwanda’s newly-decentralized health system is its vast network of over 45,000 local community health workers. Each village elects three members to serve as trained community health workers — one each for maternal health, child health, and community health. 

 

Because 85 percent of Rwanda’s people live in rural agrarian areas, more than an hour’s walk from the nearest health center, the presence of local health workers is vital, particularly for pregnant women.