Social entrepreneur Robbie Bergquist is the co-founder of Cell Phones for Soldiers. In 2004 when Robbie was 12 and his sister Brittany was 13, they heard the story of a soldier returning from Iraq with a near $8,000 phone bill. They couldn’t believe that a man serving his country was unable to call his family for free. So they decided to do something about it. With just $21 and some help from their parents, Cell Phones for Soldiers was born. Today the nonprofit organization provides cost-free communication services and emergency funding to active-duty military members and veterans. They've provided more than 300 million minutes of free talk time and have recycled 15 million cell phones for the cause. Robbie, now age 25, is the recipient of the Jefferson Award for Public Service and was recently named in the Forbes 30 Under 30 List.  Donate your used cell phone to Cell Phones for [...]

Most foreigners who visit Indonesia end up at the beaches of Bali. But not Adam Miller, a young conservationist from St. Louis. While volunteering at a pet shop at age 10, he came up with the vision of one day working in Indonesia to help the animals there. His vision quickly became an obsession. Many years later, Adam found himself in a remote village in Borneo, Indonesia. It’s a part of southeast Asia facing the fastest rate of deforestation in the world and the second highest number of endangered species in the world. He lived there for six months on a total budget of $1,000 and built up a nonprofit organization called Planet Indonesia. In this podcast episode, Adam discusses the challenges of working in a country with a culture that is vastly different. When he goes running, random fathers in the community might stop to offer their daughters as wives. And you will find out what Adam [...]

Social entrepreneur Rachel Sumekh is the founder and CEO of Swipe Out Hunger. This nonprofit organization works to end hunger by activating college students to donate their unused meal points. Since Swipe Out Hunger began in 2009 as a college pet project, the NGO has served 1.3 million meals. Rachel Sumekh was recently awarded Champion of Change by The White House and named in the Forbes 30 Under 30 List for Social Entrepreneurship. In this episode, Rachel Sumekh talks openly about her inner doubts, challenges as a Persian-American social entrepreneur, how she responded to opposition from campus administrators, and what she did when she was told "you're just too nice to be a leader." Listen to it on iTunes or Stitcher, and hit the subscribe button to download future episodes automatically. Stream by clicking here. Download as an MP3 by right-clicking here and choosing “save as.” This episode is sponsored by the Tikker, the death watch that counts down your life [...]

Every morning for nearly a decade, CNN Hero Razia Jan drank a cup of water from her school's well to make sure it hadn’t been poisoned overnight by the Taliban.   She works in a part of Afghanistan where girls face unimaginable obstacles just to attend school. They must face the threat of getting acid thrown onto their faces, risk buying snacks with grenades hidden inside them, and make sure nobody has sprayed poisoned gas into their classrooms. Razia Jan worked as a tailor and dry cleaner before starting Razia's Ray of Hope Foundation in 2008, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of women and children in Afghanistan through education. She operates the Zabuli Education Center, a school that she founded in rural Afghanistan that provides a free education to 625 girls.  Listen to it on iTunes or Stitcher, and hit the subscribe button to download future episodes automatically. Stream by clicking here. Download as [...]

As an investment banker, Andy Stein never imagined that a visit to an orphanage in Chile would change his life, and the life of thousands of others. In 2001, after 25 years on Wall Street, Andy Stein left everything behind to start the Orphaned Starfish Foundation, a nonprofit organization that works with orphaned, trafficked, and at-risk youth around the world. The NGO has built 50 vocational centers and computer labs in 25 countries. I first read about Andy Stein on The CNN Freedom Project, a TV show highlighting projects around the world that are fighting modern-day slavery. I never imagined I'd have the opportunity to interview Andy to learn about his work, travels, and why he loves to do magic tricks during his spare time. Listen to it on iTunes or Stitcher, and hit the subscribe button to download future episodes automatically. Stream by clicking here. Download as an MP3 by right-clicking here and choosing “save as.” Reading List Three Cups of Tea: One Man's [...]

WARNING: If you are involved or will be involved in the medical field, this episode may alter your future aspirations... CNN Hero Dr. Ben LaBrot began working on fishing boats in California at age 11 and always knew that he was destined to live at sea. In 2009, he began refurbishing a 76-foot-long fishing boat and named it The Southern Wind. A year later, Dr. Ben and his penniless team left EVERYTHING behind and set sail to Haiti to cure the poor. “My high school counselor never told me that these kinds of jobs and solutions existed,” he said. So he created a nonprofit organization and called it the Floating Doctors.  “I pushed all my chips in the center of the table. I was all in,” he said. Upon arrival, Dr. Ben LaBrot said to himself, “I’m about to find out if this works or if I just wasted a whole lot of everyone’s time, money, and resources.” For [...]

Social entrepreneur Henry May is the founder of CoSchool, a B-Corp* that's worked with 5,000 youth in Bogota, Colombia. CoSchool works to build emotional, social, and leadership skills through extracurricular programs. In this episode, Henry May speaks about his journey of self discovery, hardest moments, greatest lessons, and why he decided to make CoSchool a B-Corp instead of a nonprofit organization. Henry May is a young teacher from England and a huge soccer fanatic. His work has been recognized by Ashoka, the world’s leading social entrepreneurship agency and by Unreasonable Institute. He is also the founder of The Huracan Foundation, a global soccer movement. Top quotes: “The self-doubt never goes away, it’s part of being human.” "I saved up by eating rice and lentils every day and as I watched my friends go out on weekends." “Without that driving force, you’ll just step aside when the hardship comes.” “When I’m not having difficult conversations, problems start to appear.” “If it’s going [...]

Today’s guest is social entrepreneur Doug Bunch, a full-time attorney from DC and the co-founder of Global Playground. It’s a nonprofit organization providing educational opportunities around the world. They’ve built schools, computer labs, and libraries in eight different countries (Uganda, Cambodia, Thailand, Honduras, Vietnam, Myanmar, Philippines, Kenya). In 2010, they partnered with us here at the Villa Soleada Bilingual School in Honduras to fund the technology lab in the school. Thanks to Doug Bunch and his team, our kids now have access to a computer lab full of laptops. You can now work for Global Playground as a GP Fellow in one of their project sites. Expenses are paid for in these fellowships! They are also accepting applications for a position where you'll get to travel to ALL of their project sites around the world in a span of two years. Listen to it on iTunes or Stitcher, and hit the subscribe button to download future episodes automatically. Stream by [...]

Social Entrepreneur Seth Maxwell has the goal of providing clean water to every single community in Swaziland. And he is on his way of doing it at age 28. At age 19, Seth founded Thirst Project with his friends from college. Together, they set out to end the number one global killer of children: the world’s water crisis. Since raising $1,700 at their very first fundraising event, Thirst Project has worked with students from over 400 schools to raise 8 million dollars. They've provided 300,000 people with safe drinking water around the world. Seth Maxwell is the recipient of VH1’s Do Something Award and was recently named in the Forbes 30 Under 30 List for Social Entrepreneurship. Text THIRST to 97779 to get connected to a staff person from Thirst Project. Listen to it on iTunes or Stitcher, and hit the subscribe button to download future episodes automatically. Stream by clicking here. Download as [...]