A moment of awesomeness that should not go unnoticed
Something in the news a couple of weeks back that I just found out about (apologies if you already knew about this):
At the start of this month, new laws came into effect in India codifying a right to free education for all children from ages 6 to 14. According to the World Bank, there are about 8 million Indian children in the relevant age group who do not attend school. In 2003, that number was about 25 million. The reduction in this figure is in large part a result of significant public investment in education, with the overwhelming number of additional places being in government schools.
As in any healthy democracy, there is some disagreement over how to best implement a comprehensive education system. Many Indians would like to expand the laws to cover a greater age range. Some independent schools are concerned that new requirements to make more places available to non-paying students threaten their ability to turn a profit, and therefore to remain open as privately-run institutions. I don't claim to know what kind of budgetary constraints the government and businesses in India feel, so I'm in no position to speculate as to what would be numerically optimal, or even viable. Nevertheless, the movement of the world's largest democracy towards a system of guaranteed basic education is one of the biggest good news stories of the last decade, and India looks well-placed to ensure that its target of universal access to schooling is soon a reality.
So there you go. A nice story that doesn't get a great deal of attention in Western media but will likely have a huge positive impact on many millions of people.