In the developing world, it's about time that women are on the agenda. For instance, 80 percent of small-subsistence farmers in sub-Saharan Africa are women, and yet all the programs in the past were predominantly focused on men.

If you don't have an effective teacher in front of the classroom, you won't change the trajectory for students.

When we better understand the realities of these women's lives, we are able to design and deliver solutions that are more useful to them.

Contraceptives unlock one of the most dormant, but potentially powerful assets in development: women as decision-makers. When women have the power to make choices about their families, they tend to decide precisely what demographers, economists, and development experts recommend. They invest in the long-term human capital of their families.

One life is worth no more or less than any other

I learn in a different way. I learn experientially.

I felt suicidal. I couldn't stop crying. I remember thinking, wouldn't it be great if the car crashed and I died?