Dear Max,
Your mother and I don't yet have the
words to describe the hope you give us for the future. Your new life is full of
promise, and we hope you will be happy and healthy so you can explore it fully.
You've already given us a reason to reflect on the world we hope you live in.
Like all parents, we want you to
grow up in a world better than ours today.
While headlines often focus on
what's wrong, in many ways the world is getting better. Health is improving.
Poverty is shrinking. Knowledge is growing. People are connecting.
Technological progress in every field means your life should be dramatically
better than ours today.
We will do our part to make this
happen, not only because we love you, but also because we have a moral
responsibility to all children in the next generation.
We believe all lives have equal
value, and that includes the many more people who will live in future
generations than live today. Our society has an obligation to invest now to
improve the lives of all those coming into this world, not just those already
here.
But right now, we don't always
collectively direct our resources at the biggest opportunities and problems
your generation will face.
Consider disease. Today we spend
about 50 times more as a society treating people who are sick than we invest in
research so you won't get sick in the first place.
Medicine has only been a real
science for less than 100 years, and we've already seen complete cures for some
diseases and good progress for others. As technology accelerates, we have a
real shot at preventing, curing or managing all or most of the rest in the next
100 years.
Today, most people die from five
things -- heart disease, cancer, stroke, neurodegenerative and infectious
diseases -- and we can make faster progress on these and other problems.
Once we recognize that your
generation and your children's generation may not have to suffer from disease,
we collectively have a responsibility to tilt our investments a bit more
towards the future to make this reality. Your mother and I want to do our part.
Curing disease will take time. Over
short periods of five or ten years, it may not seem like we're making much of a
difference. But over the long term, seeds planted now will grow, and one day,
you or your children will see what we can only imagine: a world without
suffering from disease.
There are so many opportunities just
like this. If society focuses more of its energy on these great challenges, we
will leave your generation a much better world.
• • •
Our hopes for your generation focus
on two ideas: advancing human potential and promoting equality.
Advancing human potential is about
pushing the boundaries on how great a human life can be.
Can you learn and experience 100
times more than we do today?
Can our generation cure disease so
you live much longer and healthier lives?
Can we connect the world so you have
access to every idea, person and opportunity?
Can we harness more clean energy so
you can invent things we can't conceive of today while protecting the
environment?
Can we cultivate entrepreneurship so
you can build any business and solve any challenge to grow peace and
prosperity?
Promoting equality is about making
sure everyone has access to these opportunities -- regardless of the nation,
families or circumstances they are born into.
Our society must do this not only
for justice or charity, but for the greatness of human progress.
Today we are robbed of the potential
so many have to offer. The only way to achieve our full potential is to channel
the talents, ideas and contributions of every person in the world.
Can our generation eliminate poverty
and hunger?
Can we provide everyone with basic
healthcare?
Can we build inclusive and welcoming
communities?
Can we nurture peaceful and
understanding relationships between people of all nations?
Can we truly empower everyone --
women, children, underrepresented minorities, immigrants and the unconnected?
If our generation makes the right
investments, the answer to each of these questions can be yes -- and hopefully
within your lifetime.
• • •
This mission -- advancing human
potential and promoting equality -- will require a new approach for all working
towards these goals.
We must make long term investments
over 25, 50 or even 100 years. The greatest challenges require very long time
horizons and cannot be solved by short term thinking.
We must engage directly with the
people we serve. We can't empower people if we don't understand the needs and
desires of their communities.
We must build technology to make
change. Many institutions invest money in these challenges, but most progress
comes from productivity gains through innovation.
We must participate in policy and
advocacy to shape debates. Many institutions are unwilling to do this, but
progress must be supported by movements to be sustainable.
We must back the strongest and most
independent leaders in each field. Partnering with experts is more effective
for the mission than trying to lead efforts ourselves.
We must take risks today to learn
lessons for tomorrow. We're early in our learning and many things we try won't
work, but we'll listen and learn and keep improving.
• • •
Our experience with personalized
learning, internet access, and community education and health has shaped our
philosophy.
Our generation grew up in classrooms
where we all learned the same things at the same pace regardless of our
interests or needs.
Your generation will set goals for
what you want to become -- like an engineer, health worker, writer or community
leader. You'll have technology that understands how you learn best and where
you need to focus. You'll advance quickly in subjects that interest you most,
and get as much help as you need in your most challenging areas. You'll explore
topics that aren't even offered in schools today. Your teachers will also have
better tools and data to help you achieve your goals.
Even better, students around the
world will be able to use personalized learning tools over the internet, even
if they don't live near good schools. Of course it will take more than
technology to give everyone a fair start in life, but personalized learning can
be one scalable way to give all children a better education and more equal
opportunity.
We're starting to build this
technology now, and the results are already promising. Not only do students
perform better on tests, but they gain the skills and confidence to learn
anything they want. And this journey is just beginning. The technology and teaching
will rapidly improve every year you're in school.
Your mother and I have both taught
students and we've seen what it takes to make this work. It will take working
with the strongest leaders in education to help schools around the world adopt
personalized learning. It will take engaging with communities, which is why
we're starting in our San Francisco Bay Area community. It will take building
new technology and trying new ideas. And it will take making mistakes and
learning many lessons before achieving these goals.
But once we understand the world we
can create for your generation, we have a responsibility as a society to focus
our investments on the future to make this reality.
Together, we can do this. And when
we do, personalized learning will not only help students in good schools, it
will help provide more equal opportunity to anyone with an internet connection.
• • •
Many of the greatest opportunities
for your generation will come from giving everyone access to the internet.
People often think of the internet
as just for entertainment or communication. But for the majority of people in
the world, the internet can be a lifeline.
It provides education if you don't
live near a good school. It provides health information on how to avoid
diseases or raise healthy children if you don't live near a doctor. It provides
financial services if you don't live near a bank. It provides access to jobs
and opportunities if you don't live in a good economy.
The internet is so important that
for every 10 people who gain internet access, about one person is lifted out of
poverty and about one new job is created.
Yet still more than half of the
world's population -- more than 4 billion people -- don't have access to the
internet.
If our generation connects them, we
can lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. We can also help
hundreds of millions of children get an education and save millions of lives by
helping people avoid disease.
This is another long term effort
that can be advanced by technology and partnership. It will take inventing new
technology to make the internet more affordable and bring access to unconnected
areas. It will take partnering with governments, non-profits and companies. It
will take engaging with communities to understand what they need. Good people
will have different views on the best path forward, and we will try many
efforts before we succeed.
But together we can succeed and
create a more equal world.
• • •
Technology can't solve problems by
itself. Building a better world starts with building strong and healthy
communities.
Children have the best opportunities
when they can learn. And they learn best when they're healthy.
Health starts early -- with loving
family, good nutrition and a safe, stable environment.
Children who face traumatic
experiences early in life often develop less healthy minds and bodies. Studies
show physical changes in brain development leading to lower cognitive ability.
Your mother is a doctor and
educator, and she has seen this firsthand.
If you have an unhealthy childhood,
it's difficult to reach your full potential.
If you have to wonder whether you'll
have food or rent, or worry about abuse or crime, then it's difficult to reach
your full potential.
If you fear you'll go to prison
rather than college because of the color of your skin, or that your family will
be deported because of your legal status, or that you may be a victim of
violence because of your religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, then
it's difficult to reach your full potential.
We need institutions that understand
these issues are all connected. That's the philosophy of the new type of school
your mother is building.
By partnering with schools, health
centers, parent groups and local governments, and by ensuring all children are
well fed and cared for starting young, we can start to treat these inequities
as connected. Only then can we collectively start to give everyone an equal
opportunity.
It will take many years to fully
develop this model. But it's another example of how advancing human potential
and promoting equality are tightly linked. If we want either, we must first
build inclusive and healthy communities.
• • •
For your generation to live in a
better world, there is so much more our generation can do.
Today your mother and I are
committing to spend our lives doing our small part to help solve these
challenges. I will continue to serve as Facebook's CEO for many, many years to
come, but these issues are too important to wait until you or we are older to
begin this work. By starting at a young age, we hope to see compounding benefits
throughout our lives.
As you begin the next generation of
the Chan Zuckerberg family, we also begin the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to join people across
the world to advance human potential and promote equality for all children in
the next generation. Our initial areas of focus will be personalized learning,
curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities.
We will give 99% of our Facebook
shares -- currently about $45 billion -- during our lives to advance this
mission. We know this is a small contribution compared to all the resources and
talents of those already working on these issues. But we want to do what we
can, working alongside many others.
We'll share more details in the
coming months once we settle into our new family rhythm and return from our
maternity and paternity leaves. We understand you'll have many questions about
why and how we're doing this.
As we become parents and enter this
next chapter of our lives, we want to share our deep appreciation for everyone
who makes this possible.
We can do this work only because we
have a strong global community behind us. Building Facebook has created
resources to improve the world for the next generation. Every member of the
Facebook community is playing a part in this work.
We can make progress towards these
opportunities only by standing on the shoulders of experts -- our mentors,
partners and many incredible people whose contributions built these fields.
And we can only focus on serving
this community and this mission because we are surrounded by loving family,
supportive friends and amazing colleagues. We hope you will have such deep and
inspiring relationships in your life too.
Max, we love you and feel a great
responsibility to leave the world a better place for you and all children. We
wish you a life filled with the same love, hope and joy you give us. We can't
wait to see what you bring to this world.
Love,
Mom and Dad
*YOUR COMMENTS/OPINIONS WOULD BE
APPRECIATED*
SOURCE: ZUCKERBERG FACEBOOK WALL
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