By Jennifer Browdy

Years ago, I took as my personal tagline the phrase “Writing to Right the World.”

I have taught a class under that banner many times at Bard College/Simon’s Rock, where I have been teaching literature and writing for more than a quarter-century. The idea of the class is that writing—of many forms and genres—can be a form of activism, a way of expressing a vision for positive change that can move out into the world, inspire others, and make a difference. 

Every human innovation first starts with an idea. Someone has a lightbulb moment, a revelation, an inspiration, and then takes the next step of expressing it—in art, in science, in any of the various fields of endeavor by which we have an impact on our world. 

In this Fired Up! special edition, a group of young people share their critique of the world as it is, and their visions for making it better.

In their powerful voices, the personal becomes political and planetary, and they speak for many others in their generation who know that the future has the potential to be so much better than what they’ve inherited from the past. 

Read, listen, get fired up—and act!