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Waking up the Words

“Knowledge without goodness is dangerous. Goodness without knowledge is weak.”

I stood on top of a two story ramshackle building constructed out of old freight containers, the scent of rotting plastic roaring in my nose, and surveyed the blackened waters, vibrating colors and constant contrasts of Mumbai. So began my three weeks in India.
I could wax on about how the dark alleys that make up the roads of a Mumbai slum made me re-evaluate my own privilege. I could tell you how I felt when, during my afternoon in a rural village several hundred miles north of Mumbai, the only word of English spoken was “white.” I could tell you that when I came back home I couldn’t look at my life without a sense of guilt and an equal compulsion to change the world.
But I won’t, because that has all been said before, and wanting to change the world doesn’t mean much without a plan. For both in India and at home, "knowledge without goodness is dangerous, and goodness without knowledge is weak." These words, carved into my elite New England prep school’s constitution in 1778 and preached to us weekly, came to life in India. I was well educated before, but now I have a driving purpose for studying.
In virtually every education policy created, education is thought of as having a single end goal: money. However, I no longer study hard for the SATs or hone my debating skills so I can live in a nice house someday. I do it because only with knowledge, power, and confidence, can I do more than stay up nights angered by injustice. I can only change the world – redesign Mumbai’s slums, resolve the debates over Charter schools, alleviate poverty in Detroit and Dharavi, fight for peace from Kiev to Somalia – if I know...

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...tober, standing before my school, my knees shook as I began with the words, “In Johannesburg in April 2008, Eudy Simelane’s naked body was found face-down in this ditch.” I spent the next thirty minutes jarring my community to action. Rarely had either LGBT issues or the issues of poor women taken the stage at all school meetings. Indeed, when I had first suggested the idea for my fellowship, I was uncertain whether I would be brave enough to give the speech in the end; most previous fellowship winners had spoken about much more mundane topics. Afterward, though, the rush of awareness I felt amongst my peers and the outpouring of support for Ndumie and her organization was incredible. Ndumie inspired me to be a fighter, and with her story, I inspired others. Ndumie showed me, the smallest efforts in fighting a massive problem could ultimately chip a path to victory.

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