CGI U’s five focus areas guide conversations within the CGI U community and allow CGI U students to form strategic networks around common issues. While concerns in Education, Environment and Climate Change, Peace and Human Rights, Poverty Alleviation, and Public Health are cross-cutting and often inextricably linked, CGI U asks commitment-makers to select the focus area most relevant to their work. Review the brief descriptions below to learn more about the five focus areas.
EDUCATION
A new generation of innovators is leading initiatives to expand access to education, improve existing education systems, better integrate technology into classrooms, and provide critical higher education opportunities to economically disadvantaged groups. These movements define and improve the central roles that schools, universities, and technology can play in providing academic knowledge, values, and skills for economic and professional development.
ENVIRONMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Empirical scientific records provide abundant evidence of the dire consequences that climate change is having on both human societies and ecosystems. Throughout the world, a groundswell of eco-entrepreneurs and young leaders are expanding the renewable energy economy, creating green jobs, and accelerating progress towards a sustainable future.
POVERTY ALLEVIATION
Poverty is both a cause and consequence of inadequate education systems, scarce job opportunities, social exclusion, political instability, violent conflict, food insecurity, demographic pressures, and human migration. Students and universities are tirelessly developing and scaling new innovations in the fields of economic empowerment, affordable technology, and agricultural development that will enable millions around the globe to lift themselves from poverty.
PEACE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Human rights abuses stemming from a wide range of geopolitical, military, and cultural conflicts are a scourge on the modern world. Many young leaders are taking action to address these issues by spearheading awareness campaigns, building communities of dialogue on and off campus, and bringing together diverse ethnic, religious, and political groups to forge effective, long-term solutions.
PUBLIC HEALTH
Our increasingly interconnected world enables health risks to spread quickly across borders, linking the health of the world’s communities more closely than ever before. While many of the world’s biggest public health challenges disproportionately affect disadvantaged and vulnerable groups, students are at the forefront of the movement to expand access to essential services and medicines by exploring innovative ways to promote health and prevent disease in both developed and developing regions.
