Equality: My Fundamental Value
I can’t speak for everyone, but I can speak for myself. I’m doing this for the child in Africa who is going to use free textbooks and reference works produced by our community and find a solution to the crushing poverty that surrounds him.
-Jimmy Wales speaking about Wikipedia
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what my fundamental values are. Or maybe more precisely, what my fundamental value is. In the last few weeks it has become abundantly clear to me. My fundamental value is to make equal access to education a reality for everyone on the planet.
People have been striving for equality for centuries. Martin Luther King Jr.’s mission was equality for blacks in America. Nelson Mandela’s mission was equality and freedom from apartheid in South Africa. And while we’ve made a lot of progess towards equality the fact of the matter is that we’re still a long ways from true equality.
We’re currently based in Los Angeles and like most major cities there is significant inequality in the way kids are educated. The child going to school in Beverly Hills or Manhattan Beach is going to get, on average, a much better education than the kid growing up in Compton or Inglewood (spent a good amount of time in a school in the latter so I’ve seen this first hand). And when we expand our consciousness to look at the global situation the differences become even more striking. The boy or girl growing up in Ghana or Ethiopia simply doesn’t have the same resources as the boy or girl growing up in a posh suburb of any major urban area.
Without equal access to a world-class education true equality cannot exist.
Bono was quoted recently in Time Magazine as saying, “It is–or it ought to be–unacceptable that an accident of longitude and latitude determines whether a child lives or dies.” I agree 100% with that. And I also feel that it should be unacceptable than an accident of longitude and latitude determines the quality of a child’s education.
Just a decade ago it was hard to imagine a child in Africa growing up listening to the best lecturers from Harvard and MIT. Today, with things like the sub-$100 laptop and mesh networking we’re almost there. The power of that idea is immense.
The next Einstein might be growing up in Madagascar right now.
The next Oprah might be a kindergarten girl in Sierra Leone.
There’s a lot to be done in this world. I often liken what groups like the One campaign and AMREF are doing to throwing life preservers to people who are drowning. Sitting on the shore and lecturing them on how to swim doesn’t help the current situation. But if people never learn to swim they’re going to find themselves in the same situation again and again in the future.
Which is why it has to be about empowerment.
What companies like Kiva are doing. What (God willing) we’ll do. This indeed is our generation’s Moon Shot. Our opportunity to have a world that allows everyone an equal shot at greatness. An equal shot to realize their potential and live their dreams. It’s within our grasp.
It’s time to get to work.
7 Comments
- 1. Michael Wofff said:
jon
we share a similar fundamental value. whereas as yours is to provide a equal access to worldclass education, mine is to provide the same for work. that is for the knowledge worker that has had your education to be able to access work from wherever they are to to participate equally in the global economy. are you aware that India has a program (the CSC project) to roll out 100,000 telecentres throughout rural India over the next two years, with the goal of setting up 600,000 altogether? Inspired by this brilliant initiative, I am currently working with South Africa for a similar strategy. Meanwhile, our virtual work platform is launching in July. Happy to share experiences. Michael
posted May 21st, 2007 at 5:23 am
- 2. Meg Murphy said:
Jon: Your work and words are inspiring and brilliant. If you hire someone else for the recent position I applied for please think about me again if a future opening should occur. I would like to help in any way I can.
Sincerely,
Meg Murphy
posted May 22nd, 2007 at 5:55 am
- 3. Qui said:
I am going this evening to talk to folks in Pasadena, concerning inclusion and how to access educational facilities with in LAUSD, a huge buraucracy that hires many gate keepers. Anyhow, I was wondering what your organization does exactly? I am a teacher/behaviorist, so I am quite interested in places that help children, all children learn!
Thanks,
Qui (key)posted June 18th, 2007 at 10:01 am
- 4. Education Revolution - Our Manifesto: 25 Rules to Live By said:
[...] 2. Equality rules We believe in Jefferson’s ideal that all men and women are created equal. However, we think that it’s a tremendous shame that education around the planet suffers from incredible inequalities. This ends up leading to tremendous disparities in income levels around the globe. By helping give everyone equal access to world-class education, we’ll move much closer to true equality. [...]
posted June 21st, 2007 at 11:46 am
- 5. Education Revolution - One Laptop Per Child: Why We Do What We Do said:
[...] The possibilities here are endless. This will change the world. I’ve written about this before in our first blog post on Edurev as well as in some posts inspired by the book The End of Poverty over on LearnOutLoud. [...]
posted July 25th, 2007 at 3:45 pm
- 6. Gabriel Dayan said:
I agree, equality of education is the key to everything else. However, in the continental US, the quality of public school education is substandard. Teachers prefer to wail “ADD!” and get kids hooked on ritalin instead of learning how to teach kids that think differently.
My feeling is that multimedia tutorials allow every child to learn in their own way at their own pace. This allows a few highly skilled teachers to educate billions simply by authoring interactive DVD’s and web sites. As for the thousands of disgruntled “teachers” out there, I’m sure they can discover hidden talents and pursue other careers to which they are better suited… consequently having more fun and making more money.
posted August 5th, 2007 at 8:21 am
- 7. Benjamin said:
I love what you are doing and definitely feel the same…We need to help people feel empowered about themselves and it starts with the children. The priorities on earth are out of whack right now, and at the same time, shifting drastically and very fast. We are starting to wake up spiritual on a larger scale and that will help create more harmony on this planet…
posted May 7th, 2008 at 10:28 am
