Carly Zalenski decided to build a school for children in Vietnam. It took her two years. She was 12.

Carly Zalenski's eyes filled with tears as the dusty bus rattled down a dirt road in southern Vietnam. The 14-year-old and her family had traveled by plane from Canton, Ohio, to Ho Chi Minh City and then by bus deep into the Mekong Delta. Now, as they approached the village, hundreds of cheering schoolchildren lined the entrance to the Hoa Lac School, a two-story concrete building that Carly had raised money for.

“Vietnam, compared with other countries in the region, spends a lot of money on higher education,” said Ben Wilkinson, a representative of Harvard University’s Vietnam Program in Ho Chi Minh City.

“I would argue that money is not even the decisive factor [in establishing a world-class university.]”

Dear Mona Foundation,

I would like to inform you of the nature of this donation. I am a seventh grade student at Neward Center for Creative Learning (NCCL) in Newark Delaware. My class is doing a project, inspired by one of Oprah's shows, in which we each receive $50 to spend on helping people or animals in need.

While many university students complain about the high cost of textbooks, Tu Pham is thankful for the books lining the shelves of local bookstores and libraries.

Pham, a chemistry doctoral candidate at the University of Oklahoma, got her undergraduate degree in Vietnam, where she is from.

The ‘advanced syllabuses’ being implemented in 13 key universities in Vietnam are expected to become models for Vietnam’s education. However, students have said, after only three years, that they are disappointed with the project.