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Jun 12, 2011

"Life shrinks and expands in proportion to one's courage." --Anais Nin

How One Teenager Used Her Life Savings

After finishing high school in New Jersey, Maggie Doyne took a gap year during which she did service projects and cultural programs in South Asia. In India, she met a teenage refugee who had escaped Nepal seven years earlier. Maggie felt moved to accompany the girl back to Nepal in search of her family. In the process, she was deeply touched by the orphans she met in the villages. "It was really this rude awakening," Maggie said. "I thought, it only takes $5 admission and $5 for a uniform to put her into school. Why can't I do that?" So Maggie had her parents wire her all $5000 of her life savings, using it to build an orphanage and then a school for children in that remote area. She continues to run it at the ripe age of 24.