The UNC-Duke-Bennett Millennium Village Project aims to raise $1.5 million by June 2008 in the first student-led sponsorship of a Millennium Village as a tangible way of demonstrating students’ commitment to the international effort to eradicate extreme poverty.

We the students of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Duke University, and Bennett College, as members of a greater global community, feel a responsibility to dedicate our energy and resources to empower those in extreme poverty, and to demonstrate the role of universities as catalysts for global change.

Furthermore, we see this as a unique opportunity to unite students, faculty, and community members to engage in an academic dialogue to critically assess and improve sustainable development strategies such as the Millennium Village model.

We hope that the UNC-Duke-Bennett Millennium Village Project can set a precedent for the involvement of other universities, and ultimately create a generation of students committed to ending extreme poverty.