Chris Bennett is a rising senior at Stanford University, majoring in Earth Systems, an interdisciplinary environmental studies program. Chris has previously interned with the Millennium Challenge Corporation, researched renewable energy and economic development in India, and studied tropical ecology in Australia. Chris is excited by new approaches to solving global problems, traveling, and documentary video. Feel free to contact him at cbennett10@gmail.com
Imagine that it’s the year 2020. Billions of dollars in aid and charity are no longer needed in the developing world. Instead, local businesses have flourished over the last ten years in places like sub-Saharan Africa, creating wealth and possibility for those previously left behind. Businesses in areas like agriculture, information technology and health services transform the lives of those who previously lacked access to proper healthcare and quality education. It’s an exciting prospect that begs a simple question: how do we get there? Acumen Fund’s work in empowering transformative businesses to solve poverty is groundbreaking, but they can’t do it alone. Acumen has started the conversation, but students and young professionals will be important allies in extending this work to new places and driving change towards this vision for the future.
I was fortunate enough to attend the Acumen Fund’s inaugural Student Leader Workshop two months ago, an exciting step towards building this alliance. I came to the workshop with high expectations, but the experience was far more exciting than I could have imagined. I attribute this to the power of the community I was introduced to over those three days, both within Acumen Fund and the students I met from around the world. What I was fortunate enough to experience was an intellectually rich and yet action-oriented discussion in which we decided to roll up our sleeves and walk the talk.
Leadership on the campus level can sometimes come off as little more than an exercise in resume building or staying busy. That notion was strongly challenged by my three days at the Acumen Fund office. In our first session at the workshop, Seth Godin made the case for action by arguing that the only thing holding us back from transformative action is our inability to decide to do so (I highly recommend watching his talk). The extraordinary thing about the workshop is that I decided, and I’m confident the other 16 students in attendance did as well.
The workshop acted as a spark for exciting change, both personally and among the community of leaders we formed. The experience solidified my decision to pursue a career with impact. This summer, I’m in Washington, DC, interning with Ashoka’s University Program as well as engaging in social media work for a small non-profit called the Solar Electric Light Fund. Some of my more adventurous fellow student leaders are now working with or starting social enterprises around the world, from Argentina to India. We are excited to bring new ideas and methods of solving old problems back to school in the fall.
As a result of our Student Leader’s workshop, we’ve proposed developing an Acumen product, which we hope to sell on campuses to raise funds and awareness for Acumen’s efforts to shift the conversation on global poverty. One of the potential ideas is for an Acumen bag tag for a luggage piece, backpack or purse. We hope this would spark conversations, whether on campus or in an airport, and demonstrate the interconnectedness of our world. Stay tuned!
In addition, we’re creating a network of students interested in making the same decision that we made. To do so, we are putting together a collaborative video that will demonstrate our generation’s global interconnectedness and interest in confronting the challenges of poverty. Check out The Poverty Message on Facebook to learn more!
We realize that this movement will need more than a small group of students creating a video and raising funds. We’ll need teams of students and young people on college campuses across the country, ready to help change the way our generation confronts poverty. In addition to Facebook, we also invite you to join our online communities on LinkedIn and Ning. We’re looking forward to starting the conversation! The task before us is huge, but so are the possibilities. In the words of Victor Hugo: “There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time has come.”





