Paralympian Abdi Jama has two ambitions at the forefront of his mind. Firstly, the wheelchair basketball player wants to get selected for Team GB’s squad for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. [...]  Jama hopes to inspire more disabled athletes to get active in his native Somalia. 

The basics of the campaign are to empower the conference attendees to take action, especially in developing countries, and mobilize global citizens to secure safe air all parts of the world. The end goal of the campaign is to establish clean air as a basic human right and to implement it within the international pantheon of essential public health services akin to clean water, vaccinations, family planning and primary care.

Even after a long flight and jet lag, 11 female, Iraqi athletes and three coaches arrived to the United States this December bright-eyed and ready for an empowering experience. They were eager to listen, ask questions, and talk about their backgrounds as teenage soccer players and students in Iraq. Although most of the young women met for the first time at the airport, coming from three different cities -- Baghdad, Kirkuk, and Erbil -- they already acted like teammates.

One of the most profound, defining moments of my career was when I worked as a Special Assitant to Charlotte Beers during her tenure as Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy & Public Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. If you've seen the film The Devil Wears Prada , you would have a sense of what working for her was like.