Holy Stoked, a small collective based in Bangalore, is working to create a community of skaters in a country where many people have never even seen a skateboard. Parks are important to any young skate scene—especially in places without great street spots—so Holy Stoked cofounders Shake and Soms reached out to Levi’s about teaming up to build a park in Bangalore. Lo and behold the jeans giant agreed to help.

Summer exchange programmes are a vibrant way for universities around the world to swap intellectually stimulating dialogues, cultures, friendships and create memories. If one wants to learn outside the textbook and curriculum, learning from the ‘university of life’ through summer exchange experiences remains a very credible way for the international community of students. Linda Agnell, director of exchange programmes, American University of Sharjah, details how students can make the most of them.

Expansion is in the pipeline for Erasmus, the European Union’s higher education exchange programme. Since its launch in 1987, more than three million students have benefited from the system, which supports cooperation between 33 countries.

In Miami, the couple's short visit to Cuba triggered outrage. Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said the trip was nothing more than a "wedding anniversary vacation not even disguised as a cultural program," while Sen. Marco Rubio accused the Carters of "funding the regime's systematic trampling of people's human rights."

The EU's student exchange scheme, Erasmus, has reached its 3 millionth participant since the programme was set up in 1987, the European Commission said on Monday (8 July). The statistics also show that in the academic year 2011-2012, more than 250,000 students went to study abroad or take up a job training for six months.

Political leaders in central and south America are looking to Maori as a way to enhance their own traditional communities. Federation of Maori Authorities' chair Traci Houpapa visited a number of countries in Latin America earlier this year with the prime minister. She was asked by leaders there why Maori have become so economically and strategically sophisticated, and how they can empower their first nations peoples.

On 12 July, Malala will be joined by hundreds of students from more than 80 countries in a unique Youth Assembly, where diplomats will take a back seat as young people take over the UN. They will gather to issue a global call for quality education for all. Education is a fundamental right, a Millennium Development Goal (MDG) and crucial to mutual understanding and global citizenship. Many of us did not have to learn this lesson from a book. We lived it.

A GROUP of students who travelled to Japan on an educational cultural exchange program returned to Fiji earlier this week. The group of 19 post-graduate students were part of USP's JENESYS 2.0 project which sent them to Japan between June 9 and June 21 this year.