Role models and true stories of aspiration

From 16Guidelines

Craig Kielburger

Craig Kielburger was 12 years old when he saw a newspaper headline about a Pakistani boy, Iqbal Masih, who had been murdered for speaking out about the working conditions he had endured in the carpet-making industry. From that moment, Craig’s life began to change. He photocopied the article, wnet down to the local library to research statistics on child labour, and invited some of his classmates round for ‘pop and pizza’ to discuss what they could do to improve the lives of children on the other side of the world.

Twelve years later, Craig’s organisation Free the Children has inspired more than a million young people to get involved in humanitarian activities. Its mission is to free children everywhere from abuse or exploitation, and from the idea that they are not old enough, smart enough or capable enough to change the world. Free The Children has built over 450 schools, provided medical supplies and health care for 505,000 people, developed access to sustainable sources of income for marginalized women and their families, and provided access to quality sanitation and clean water for 132,000 people. It is funded, driven and staffed by children and youth.

In parallel with their humanitarian work, Craig and his brother Marc campaign about the importance of helping young people to realise their aspirations. In 1999 they established Leaders Today, an organization that provides leadership training to more than 350,000 young people each year. They run a website that encourages young people to report on and discuss global issues. Their most recent book, From Me to We, proposes that every young person has an issue that hits them in the heart – and that the challenge is to act on it. “Find your gift. Find your passion. Put them together and you will change the world. It only takes one small act to make a difference.”

Jane Tomlinson

When mother-of-two Jane Tomlinson was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1990, she started a three-year radiography course at hospitals in her native Yorkshire – not as a patient, but as a trainee radiographer. It proved to be only the start of an extraordinarily spirited response to her prognosis. When the cancer returned, her son was only three and she decided she wanted to do something he would remember her by. Although she had never been ‘sporty’, Jane undertook a remarkable series of physical challenges, which included the world’s first marathon run while on chemotherapy, the 2004 Ironman triathlon and a 4,200-mile cycle ride from San Francisco to New York. In the process she raised over £1.75 million for respite care, nursing and cancer research. Jane died in September 2007, seven years after being given only six months to live. The motto of the Jane Appeal is “Death doesn’t arrive with the prognosis.”