This Impressive Teen Received a College Degree Before Finishing High School

It’s probably safe to say that most 16-year-olds are thinking more about getting their driver’s license than thinking about their plans for higher education. But that certainly wasn’t the case for one Hollywood, Florida teen.
Grace Bush astonishingly earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) a week before finishing high school. So how did she do it?
Grace, who completed her undergraduate degree in just three years with a 3.8 grade point average, participated in her school’s dual enrollment program that allows gifted students the opportunity to earn college credit for selected high school courses, Yahoo! News reports.
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This whizkid told CBS Miami that she started collegiate level courses when she was only 13-years-old at Broward College, enrolling in extra classes during summers to make it all possible. In case you weren’t amazed enough already, Grace also plays the flute for the Miami Music Project orchestra and the South Florida Youth Symphony, too.
Not only is this teenager incredibly smart (she started reading when she was only 2!), but she’s also incredibly hardworking, as well. The Sun Sentinel describes her brutal schedule of staying up until 2 a.m. every night studying and sneaking in naps on her commute to school every morning. And to maintain her rigorous academic schedule, Grace skipped out on attending typical school social activities such as school dances, football games or parties. She acknowledged to the paper that she “missed out on being a kid, goofing off and wasting time.”
Looks like Grace, the third oldest of nine siblings (who were all home-schooled by their mother Gisla), is just following in the footsteps of her likewise gifted family. “My two older sisters are doing it and I’m the third to do it,” Grace told CBS. “My oldest sister already graduated and my second oldest sister is graduating in the summer.”
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Her parents told the Sun Sentinel that they put their children on this path because they can’t afford to send them all to conventional four-year colleges or universities. (Grace took her courses at local colleges for free.)
So what’s next for Grace? She’s aiming even higher, naturally, and is planning to attend FAU’s master’s program and go on to law school so she can achieve her dream of becoming chief justice.
If past performance is an indicator of future success, Grace definitely has bright days ahead.

Memphis Houses of Worship Create a Magical Night for People with Disabilities

Buoyant bubbles drifted through the air as guests — clad in tuxedos and formal dresses— arrived, walking down a red carpet. The scene is familiar to anyone who’s attended a prom, but on April 25, the remarkable night was hosted not for a high school but for Memphis residents with disabilities.
The Joy Prom, sponsored by a group of local churches, was cooked up by Ashley Parks and Ginna Rauls, both active members in the Memphis special needs community, according to Good Morning America. The two wanted to give people with disabilities a chance to experience a night of primping, pampering and dancing.
They decided to call the evening the Joy Prom because “we decided we like ‘joy’ because that’s what we hope to bring,” Parks told the Huffington Post.
Parks, the special needs ministry director for Christ United Methodist Church, enlisted the help of 350 volunteers to collect donations that would be used to create the quintessential prom experience. Back in March, the duo hosted a prom dress donation drive, and a church member offered to foot the bill for tuxedo rentals from Men’s Warehouse. The community pooled together and even bought an ice sculpture and confectionary bar for the evening.
Guests were greeted on the red carpet by Memphis Grizzlies basketball team announcer Rick Trotter, who recognized them as they arrived by limo. Each host was given a card with their date’s allergies and a list of everything he or she wanted to experience that night.
Female guests could have their nails painted or makeup done while men were able to have their shoes polished. The crowd glittered with tiaras while guests danced the night away. “We didn’t miss anything,” Parks said.
But perhaps what made this prom more special than any other is the age range of its guests. Teenagers as young at 16 mingled alongside a couple in their 60s, giving everyone a chance to experience a night to remember.
“At a certain point people phase out of things but we said, you know what, lets open this up for people over the age of 22 and think of those who may not have experienced an event like this before,” Parks said.
The night was so successful, planning for next year’s prom is already underway. We’re guessing that the 2015 prom will be just as memorable.

These Harvard Business School Students Are Empowering Women to Launch Their Own Businesses

Here in the United States, there are many hygiene and personal products that most of us take for granted. (Toothbrushes, tampons, and deodorant come to mind.) But that’s not the case worldwide. So when Amrita Siagal was an undergraduate interning at Proctor & Gamble in the female hygiene sector, she stumbled on a menstrual conundrum facing females in India.
Siagal, at that time a junior at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), realized that women in rural parts of India had little access to maxi pads, which often resulted in girls missing school during their periods. Upon returning to MIT her senior year, Siagal convinced her team to design a small-scale manufacturing process to produce the sanitary products from banana bark, a local Indian resource that’s also happens to be the most absorbent fiber in the world.
Now fast-forward a couple of years.
Siagal’s experience was the genesis for Saathi, a startup in which Siagal co-created with Kristin Kagetsu, an engineer for Oracle. Saathi is a social enterprise that partners with self-help groups in India to encourage groups of women to start their own feminine hygiene manufacturing business. Saathi sells them the machine for $500, and then aspiring entrepreneurs pay back the money within just a few months. Each small business requires two women to operate the machine and eight more to manage door-to-door sales.
The two recently won $50,000 from Harvard Business School’s New Venture Competition and will use the funds to move to India to launch the business — with the goal of setting up in five villages by the year’s end, according to Fortune. The startup hopes to target villages with around 10,000 people, which roughly means about 2,700 women who are menstruating, Siagal said.
But how does the machine work? Siagal explains that it processes the banana bark into stringy fibers, which are then dried and pressed into fluffy filling for the pads. Thanks to an excess of banana bark that must be cut away each time a tree grows a fresh crop, the pads are a locally sourced, green product.
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“The idea is that whatever village you’re in, whatever country you’re in, your local resources should be able to adapt to your needs – whether it’s coconut fiber or papyrus,” Siagal said. “This is not just about finding affordable pads but really trying to help these rural women feel empowered, to run their own enterprises and move up the socioeconomic ladder.”

This Unique Education Initiative Connects Lonely Seniors to Chatty Teens

You can use it to make Skype calls. Or to check on your baby as she sleeps. But this brilliant — yet simple — idea is probably the most charming use of webcam we’ve ever seen.
As part of a language exchange program launched by FCB Brasil and the CNA language school in Liberdade, Brazil, elderly residents of Windsor Park Retirement Community in Chicago are helping Brazilian teens improve their English through one-on-one video conversations. The exchanges are recorded and then uploaded onto a private YouTube channel for instructors to evaluate the student’s progress.
As you can see in the heartwarming video below, these exchanges don’t just help the students speak English with increased accuracy and confidence; the lessons provide the seniors new friends and exposure to a world outside their retirement home, too.
As the students and teachers share their hopes and dreams, it’s clear that strong bonds have been created. One student told his “more-mature” friend who was eager to visit Brazil, “You can stay in my house if you want.” And in a particularly touching moment, an elderly woman tells her young friend, “You are my new granddaughter.”
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“The idea is simple and it’s a win-win proposition for both the students and the American senior citizens,” Joanna Monteiro, executive creative director at FCB Brasil, told Adweek. “It’s exciting to see their reactions and contentment. It truly benefits both sides.”
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Big Bets: 8 Game-Changers Shake Things Up to Solve Our Country’s Challenges

We know about the challenges.

We know that too many young people are struggling to find employment and a ladder up; that too many children fail to receive the sort of education they need to flourish in the 21st century world; that more young people should be given the opportunity to partake in some form of national service — and that too few actually do.
At NationSwell, we are deeply concerned about these problems, and we are always grateful to find a smart report or analysis of the challenges. Developing a true and deep understanding of a problem is the first step in solving it.
But it’s what comes next that truly excites us — and defines our mission.
It’s the innovators, the pioneers, the change-makers who not only understand these national challenges and all of their complexity, but who also dare to solve them. At NationSwell, we are ever-focused on finding them, telling their powerful stories and driving action in support of their efforts.
Who are these leaders, what are their visions for change, what motivates them — and what, exactly, are the big bets they are making to advance our country?
NationSwell sat down with eight innovators at the Gathering of Leaders, an annual event held this past year in Napa, Calif., hosted by leading venture philanthropy organization New Profit, for a series of extraordinary conversations in which we posed some of those very questions.
The answers we got were as varied as they were illuminating — and, to us, heartening. If the odds are anything like Vegas, some of these risk-takers will fail and some will succeed. But, in thinking creatively and acting boldly, what these men and women are doing to tackle our biggest national challenges demands our consideration — and participation.
We invite you to watch and be part of the conversation as we present the NationSwell series: “Big Bets”.
All the best,
Greg Behrman
Editor-in-Chief
NationSwell
 
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Watch Why This Homeless Man Breaks Down In Tears After Walking Into His Friend’s House

If you can think back to March, you might recall a certain video of a local homeless man named Eric “winning” the lottery. The incredible clip, created by popular YouTube star Magic of Rahat, touched of millions of viewers (15.7 million and counting), making grown men and women cry.
And now that Magic of Rahat has a new video, it looks like you might want to reach for that box of tissues once again.
As we mentioned previously, the original video created so much buzz and community support for Eric that thousands of online donations poured in. A whopping $44,000 was raised in three weeks — twice the initial goal of $22,000.
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When asked what he was going to do with the large sum, Rahat told his fans to “stay tuned for a follow-up to see what this money will do for Eric.”
Well, the follow-up is here — and we think it’s the most heartwarming one yet.
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In the video, Rahat breaks down where exactly the $44,000 in donations went: $11,000 for a year of rent; $3,700 for furniture and appliances; $2,900 for utilities, cable and insurance; $5,000 for supplies, clothes and food; and $21,400 in a joint bank account between Eric and himself (Rahat mentions that he won’t be taking a single penny).
Want even more great news? Eric mentions in the video that he has a job now, so it looks like he’ll be able to support himself, too.
Talk about a happy ending…

Swooping In and Saving a Shuttered Factory is All in a Day’s Work for This Hardworking Mom

There are many moms who are superheroes, but Allison Faunce is one who actually comes with a cape.
As Yahoo! Finance reports, Faunce’s small business, Little Hero Capes (which sells pint-sized superhero costumes), remarkably revived the Fall River Apparel cut-and-sew factory in southeastern Massachusetts.
Like many other factories in this country, Fall River Apparel had followed the same devastating narrative of America’s manufacturing decline: Jobs shifted overseas for cheaper prices, and the 30-year business that once pulled in $3 million in revenue and employed hundreds at its peak, gradually — and painfully — went bust.
“I went in one day and there weren’t anymore orders to come — and we were forced to close,” owner Jimmy Petrosso told the site. “The day we closed and I had to tell those 100 people — I was in the corner crying.”
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But in a move that truly saved the day (not to mention, an entire company) the Somerset mom decided to approach the local sewers at Fall River to help produce costumes for her growing company that was expanding faster than she could keep up with.
Now, in a case of a wonderfully symbiotic partnership, both Faunce and the factory are profiting. Yahoo! reports that Fall River has made more than 5,000 capes, which retail for $45 each. The company has also since teamed up with Wrapeaze, another thriving company that makes hooded superhero capes for kids.
“What Allison has taught me is that there are energetic younger people out there that believe in what they’re doing and believe that making it in America matters,” Petrosso said. “That gives me hope, because it was kind of tough when we lost it all…[Even if] she puts two people to work…it’s still putting people to work. So I would hope that there are more Allison’s, and they don’t give up…”
With help from super-moms like Allison Faunce, perhaps American manufacturing can make a comeback after all.
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Meet the Incredible Octogenarian Who Continues to Save Hundreds of Lives With Her Selfless Gesture

Donating blood is truly a life-saving gift. In fact, by making just a single donation, you can save the lives of up to three people. But even more impressive than that is the woman from Ocean City, Maryland who is estimated to have impacted more than 600 lives.
How did she do it? As Yahoo! Shine reports, 80-year-old Sara ‘Lu’ Colabucci has donated her blood and platelets every single month (!) for the last 40 years.
The first time that Colabucci donated blood was back in the 1950s when her father underwent stomach surgery and needed a blood transfusion. Then in 1974, inspired by a bumper sticker encouraging more blood donations, she decided to stop by the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center (NIHCC) in Bethesda, Maryland, to donate. Ever since, she’s returned to the same medical center every single month.
Colabucci remains so dedicated to the cause of donating blood that even after moving to Ocean City (a town that’s 150 miles away) she continues to make a monthly three-hour trip back to the NIHCC. Naturally, the staff consider her like family.
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She hopes to inspire others to follow in her path. “I always felt God put me on this earth to help people,” she said. “I plan to donate until I die.”
According to the American Red Cross, every two seconds someone in the U.S. needs blood. (Despite medical advancements that have improved the treatment of illnesses, there is always a high demand for blood.) And although an estimated 38 percent of the American population is eligible to donate, less than 10 percent actually do so. As a result, healthy donors are always in demand.
An added bonus? Besides the incredible feeling that you’re saving lives and helping others, donating blood can actually improve your own health: By burning calories and even reducing the risk of heart disease and cancer.
Interested in becoming a first-time blood donor? Click here to learn more about this simple and safe procedure.

The Broadway Theater Company Giving Troubled Teens a Second Act

I am the pain you feel when you can’t express yourself.  
I am a swift kick to the stomach of injustice.
—Christopher Thompson, co-author of Stargate Theatre Company’s production of “Behind My Eyes”
Last summer, on his first day on the job as an actor and writer for the Stargate Theatre Company in New York City, Christopher Thompson contemplated quitting.  While many might consider getting paid to create performance art a step up from janitor’s assistant — his previous summer job — Thompson initially thought otherwise. Fear consumed the 17-year-old from Flatbush, one of Brooklyn’s less fashionable neighborhoods; he worried about being mocked for his grammar, handwriting and morbid humor. “I was afraid of people finding my form of expression really bad, really effed up,” says Thompson, who bears a resemblance to the Cat in the Hat with his lanky frame, long striped-knit cap and mischievous grin. He remembers feeling “extremely defensive” and thinking to himself, “This is awful. Why am I here? I’m not a talker, but I need the money.”
Thompson’s bumpy path to the stage began after a brief stint in New York’s notorious Rikers Island prison. Police arrested him last year for punching a classmate; it was his first offense. He contends that the kid he slugged during lunch harassed him about his black skin, but Thompson acknowledges that he has “anger problems.”
An alternative-to-incarceration program recommended Thompson to Stargate, a pilot project founded last year by the prestigious Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC), which produces Broadway and Off-Broadway plays. The unconventional Stargate theater troupe pays “court-involved” and at-risk teenage boys (most participants have committed low-level crimes) to stage a performance piece in a quest to reduce recidivism, teach literacy and provide work experience that looks far better on a CV than time in jail. The cast members — who applied to be part of the program — worked for a minimum of 12 hours a week for six weeks last summer to develop an autobiographical show, which they performed at New York City Center – Stage II, a sleek theater in Midtown Manhattan. After the premiere in August 2013, the teens returned to high school, though they reconvened for an encore performance of the show in October.
“We’re hiring these young men to be members of a theater company,” says David Shookhoff, education director of the Manhattan Theatre Club and an acclaimed director, most recently of the Off-Broadway hit “Breakfast With Mugabe.” “Their job is to write and to perform and to operate as an ensemble.” Shookhoff believes Stargate’s seven charter members learned to be timely, collegial and cooperative, valuable traits in the workplace.
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Shookhoff, 69, conceived Stargate in 2010 while brainstorming over poached eggs with Evan Elkin, 52, then an executive at the Vera Institute of Justice, a nonprofit policy research group in New York, and now a consultant specializing in criminal justice reform. Trustees at their respective organizations had a hunch that MTC and Vera would find common ground so they set up their key innovators on something of a blind date. “By the time breakfast was done, Stargate was hatched,” recalls Shookhoff, who favors a professorial gray beard and tweed jacket. The Leon Lowenstein Foundation, a nonprofit that focuses on education, provided the seed money for the venture, and Stargate is in talks with other major funders to underwrite its second season this summer.   
Elkin, a psychologist, believes the teenage years are an opportune time to introduce underprivileged kids to theater. “We forget to recognize that adolescence is this great moment where you sort of are figuring out . . . your own identity and the roles you want to play,” he says. “There’s this tremendous parallel process in theater.” Creating a play in a therapeutic environment, he suggests, helps young people with criminal pasts reflect on their decisions and envision overcoming the barriers they face. As one of Stargate’s grant proposals puts it, the program “engages difficult-to-engage youth.”
At the same time, Stargate empowers its players to run the show. The seven members of the first season, for instance, signed off on the firing of three cast mates who missed several rehearsals. “Young folks who have been in the system are not accustomed to having a voice and setting the tone,” observes Elkin, who watched the actors “get in touch with themselves” while crafting a “lyrical piece of art.”
Stargate’s teachers are successful show business pros, who include four-time Emmy-winning writer Judy Tate and guest artist Lemon Andersen, a convicted crack-dealer-turned-monologist who has appeared in several Spike Lee films. Rehearsals are held in the same studios used by stars working on recent Manhattan Theatre Club productions, including Mary-Louise Parker, Debra Messing and Sarah Jessica Parker. Tate, the program’s artistic director, considers it critical for the aspiring thespians to get a taste of a thriving theater company. “When the kids come to the studios of Manhattan Theatre Club and see the photos on the walls of all the productions that have happened, it creates an environment of professionalism,” she says. “They get to go home and say, ‘I’m paid as a writer. I’m paid as an actor.’”
Research on the efficacy of theater as an intervention for juvenile offenders is limited. A study of adult inmates from 1980 to 1987 found that those who had participated in arts programs were nearly 50 percent less likely to return to prison within one year of release compared with the general population of parolees. Juvenile offenders in an arts program in Washington State detention centers, according to a 2003 evaluation published in The Journal of Correctional Education, caused fewer disruptions “at a statistically significant level.”
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Stargate’s admittedly small sample of teens, who were 16 and 17 years old when they joined the program, are performing well; no graduates with criminal records have been rearrested and several improved their grades.  The cast have been invited back this summer to serve as paid recruiters and mentors for new cast members.
Anecdotally, Tate witnessed her young colleagues experience Prospero-worthy transformations. She singled out Thompson; she described him as “very, very shut down” at first and prone to hold his shoulders “up to his ears” and to mutter into his chest.  Tate advised him to change his posture if he hoped to reach an audience. “Your head must be held up because you’ve got to project your voice,” she recalls telling him. “And one day,” she continues, “he was sharing a particularly beautiful piece of writing, his shoulders went down and his head went up and he spoke out into the world.”
Thompson credits a coaching session with Lemon Andersen — Stargate brings in accomplished guest-artists to inspire the cast — as a revelation. “He taught us that you have to keep chipping at that wall, chipping at that wall. It’s not about being cool,” recalls Thompson. “It’s about showing who you are.” He adds that he now relies on writing as an outlet. “I love writing now. Even though my friends think it’s cheesy. ‘Hey, I get my emotions out there, you don’t.’”
Several weeks of theater exercises, writing sessions and rehearsals culminated in  “Behind My Eyes,” a show based on their disappointments and dreams, performed before peers, parents and even probation officers. Shookhoff, Stargate’s co-founder, remembers jumping out of his seat at the end of the show — and he wasn’t alone. “You know, standing ovations are kind of cliché on Broadway. There’s almost a sense of obligation,” he says. “A true standing ovation is what we experienced at the end of the Stargate performance, where the audience simply leapt to their feet, cheering and screaming, laughing and applauding, because they had been so deeply moved.”
Before the finale, the cast forms a circle to represent a whirring, buzzing time machine.  Each performer rotates into the spotlight to answer the question, “What if we . . . got blasted 20 years into the future?” On the stark stage decorated with black cubes and a backdrop emblazoned by the performers’ writing, a future pilot fantasizes about flying through the “clouds and moist mist with rushing winds. I’m surrounded by 432 passengers and their lives are all in my hands.” A would-be transportation czar visualizes a revamped New York in 2033, where “the subway tunnels no longer have rats because I fixed them up with the help of ‘Extreme Makeover: New York City Edition!’”
And Thompson, who mumbled through initial rehearsals and nearly quit Stargate, envisioned a promising future. “Everything I do,” he said with confidence, “will lead up to my master plan!”
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