Preschool playgroups offer rural families a head start on school

Due to recent brain development research, educators are working to add more math education into pre-school and kindergarten classes. Studies show that children of this age are actually extremely receptive to numbers and learning geometry.

Farmers in Vietnam face rising sea levels but rejected the city's water engineering projects. They prefer gradual measures to cope with climate change so scientists have allowed the farmers to steer the conversation.

Louisiana and Vietnam both need affordable solutions to rising sea levels. Leaders from Vietnam visited Louisiana to compare ideas.

Most insurance companies avoid insuring poor farmers because the transaction costs are too high, but a non-profit in Kenya created a sustainable way to cover them.

Preschoolers in the U.S. who misbehave are increasingly being expelled. In Connecticut, trained counselors educated teachers about how to deal with emotionally traumatized kids which reduced expulsions.

The company that manufactures Lifestraw, a water purification device, has found a way to distribute their product to impoverished Kenyan families for free, while still making a profit. In the global carbon credit market, businesses receive carbon credits for projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These credits can then be sold to companies who need to offset their carbon emissions, allowing green companies to make a profit off of their small ecological footprint.

Attending college is not always a given option for gifted teenagers from less-than-wealthy backgrounds. National organization QuestBridge creates a way for low-income and minority high-achieving students to go to their dream colleges free of cost.

Lack of reading material is not only a third-world problem – many poor families in the United States lack access to and funds for books. A program that helps get books to into the homes of low-income families can boost literacy, and help publishers, too.

In combatting poverty, a giant informal economic system has quietly emerged in Africa. Women participate in micro-finance organizations that loan money in order to allow them to create businesses and become self-managing.

Ecological toilets that use natural composting to break down waste are simple to construct, waterless and are easy to fix. But as philanthropists are finding, getting these to those that need it most is harder than anticipated.