A Carrboro High School student went to Washington last week to press for action on issues of poverty, hunger and climate change.

“It was really such an amazing experience,” says fifteen-year-old Amanda Padden. She was one of 30 students traveling with the ONE campaign. “We just went and got to talk to American leaders about poverty and hunger and disease and give our thoughts about what the next 15 years should look like.”

ONE Campaign organizers say if concerted actions are taken to increase spending on public services and to reduce inequality, extreme poverty could be reduced from over a billion people today to around 360 million in 2030.

That translates to a drop from 18 percent down to 4 percent of the projected world population.

More than 1,000 organizations in 130 countries have teamed up in this effort, dubbed Action 2015. Participants aim to convince world leaders to take measurable steps to fight poverty and climate change at both the upcoming UN Special Summit on Sustainable Development in September and the Paris Climate talks in December.

Students around the world are holding similar meetings with leaders in India, Nigeria, the United Kingdom, Kenya, Uganda, and Norway as part of the outreach effort.

Padden says the enthusiasm of one Carrboro High teacher helped ignite her passion for global health issues.

“I have a teacher who has just really worked to get us involved in global health and get us to learn about the different problems around the world and it just sparked my interest. He helped us to get involved with the ONE Campaign.”

She’d like to see more students her age taking an interest in global health.

“I think just getting people to learn about the world and to look a little farther outside of North Carolina, outside of the United States and see what the problems are would really be a huge help,” says Padden.

You can find out more about the ONE Campaign here.

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