The Promise of a Pencil: How an Ordinary Person Can Create Extraordinary Change Hardcover - 2014

From one of ForbesâÈçs âÈê30 Under 30âÈë and Wired MagazineâÈçs âÈê50 People Who Are Changing the World,âÈë the inspiring memoir of a young man who traded a lucrative career in finance to found Pencils of PromiseâÈ'the groundbreaking organization that has built more than 125 schools across the developing world.

Raised in Greenwich, Connecticut, where privilege was the norm, Adam Braun always dreamed of a career on Wall Street. While studying economics and entrepreneurship at Brown University, his future path seemed inevitable, until he started traveling to some of the most impoverished regions of the world asking a child in each country what they wanted most. In India, a young boy begging on the street answered, âÈêa pencil.âÈë The powerful simplicity of this response altered BraunâÈçs lifeâÈ'and his purposeâÈ'forever.

Upon graduation he accepted a job at a prestigious consulting firm, but his passion for global education was too strong to ignore. In 2008, starting with just $25 of his own money on his twenty-fifth birthday, Braun left his job to demonstrate that one school could be built through the power of many small acts. His âÈêfor-purposeâÈë approach turned the nonprofit paradigm on its head and blazed a new path for how modern movements are created. Today, Pencils of Promise has become a leader in social media for social good, and the official charity of many business moguls and celebrities, including Justin Bieber.

The Promise of a Pencil chronicles BraunâÈçs journey to find his calling and the lessons learned along the way.