School Farms Target Food Insecurity, ‘Supermarket Redlining'

A nonprofit organization, the Internationals Network for Public Schools, delivers a first-class education to the children of illegal immigrants, helping to break the cycle of poverty and provide them a path to advance in life.

At the Fujitsu factory in Japan, a significant decline in demand for semiconductor computer chips meant the company had large empty factory space sitting unused. A new business approach allowed them to dually address both the need to evolve their business model with a global decline of viable agricultural space needed to grow the world's food. Now, the factory houses indoor vegetable gardens, soil free and less resource-heavy than traditional farmland.

Two schools in New York and Washington state are breaking the traditional high school mold by combining college preparation with career and technical education. Amadou Diallo writes, "Debating whether kids need hands-on training or academic rigor misses the point."

In several small rural towns in Texas, mental health professionals from Texas Tech are offering telemedicine counseling to make up for a lack of counselors available in local middle and high schools. The Governor's office has now asked the successful school districts to develop a training program for teachers in other Texas districts in order to scale the model.

Now in 10 states and 17 countries, the P-TECH program combines high school with internships and free community college classes. In low-income neighborhoods in Newburgh, New York, P-TECH has helped increase earning and career potential and started to close the skills gap.

At one Boston public school, teachers are updating curricula to provide students with history lessons that contextualize current national debates about immigration policy.

At Capital City Public Charter School, students are graded based not only on academic skills but also social and emotional skills. The Washington D.C. school has a high graduation rate and college enrollment rate.

The rapid development of emerging economies across Asia and Africa is lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty - but there is much debate as to how to best structure this growth. If these economies evolve in the same way as in the West - with unchecked, excessive resource consumption and heavy pollution - the planet may be on the fast track to disaster. Earthrise explores how these nations can grow sustainably using improved, eco-conscious technologies like renewable energy and eco-friendly farming practices.

The Ajo Center for Sustainable Agriculture has helped the town of Ajo in Arizona distribute affordable and nutrient-dense food to the community after the coronavirus pandemic created a significant financial strain on many families. Additional support has come from the town's participation in the Environmental Protection Agency's program Local Food, Local Places which "provides technical support and expertise to help towns leverage food systems to boost economic development."

In Kenya, like other countries in the world, deforestation is the major driver of tree cover loss. To solve this, a local startup called Seedball Kenya has developed the seedball technology whereby seeds of indigenous tree and grass species are coated with charcoal waste mixed with nutritious binders then thrown like balls into the planting grounds.