Donn Young Photography, www.donnyoung.com

After graduating from UNC, Callie Brauel could have gone to Italy on a full MBA scholarship, but she opted instead to focus on a promising yet still fledgling nonprofit she started after spending a semester in Ghana.

The nonprofit works with teen mothers from the Ghanaian capital of Accra, providing them with a home and a basic education, as well as entrepreneurial skills and social services. Its formation and current success stem from Brauel’s initial reaction to the plight of street children when she first went to Ghana in 2008.

 “You’d just be walking down the street, and little 6-year-olds would be selling stuff,” she said, “and you were wondering, ‘Why aren’t these kids in school?'”

Brauel and co-founder Rebecca Brandt decided to call the nonprofit A Ban Against Neglect, a play on the west African Adinkra symbol aban, which means fence and is meant to convey a sense of safety and security for the girls who, as Brauel notes, have “faced things we couldn’t even imagine.”

Brauel is one of many who have graduated from UNC and applied their know-how to helping others around the globe. Appearing in the May/June issue of the Carolina Alumni Review, here are some of their stories: Change Agents. Members of the General Alumni Association can find a digital version of the magazine here: Alumni Review