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We are in the midst of World Water Week. The 2008 theme is "Progress and Prospects on Water: For a Clean and Healthy World with Special Focus on Sanitation." World Water Week is a international conference focused on collaboration and the promotion of work that advances environmental and humanitarian development. The United Nations proclaimed 2008 the International Year of Sanitation. With a focus on the Millennium Development Goals, the theme for World Water Week was chosen to draw attention to sanitation needs and the effect of poor sanitation worldwide. Goal seven - the goal of ensuring environmental sustainability- poses an enormous challenge, as do the sub goals, or target indicators. World Water Week highlights a target set by the MDG's that calls for the reduction, by half, of the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water.

There are 17 goals drafted to focus on the most critical universal issues that will affect us all over the next 15 years. These range from ensuring health and wellbeing, to building resilient infrastructure, protecting the biosphere to achieving gender equality. The goals and the issues they address are interdependent, and if fully realized they would see the complete eradication of extreme poverty by 2030 and ensure that urgent action is taken to deal with the threat and impacts of climate change.

How can states create and implement an action plan to support education goals? Over the past four years, the North Carolina State Board of Education has been analyzing and strengthening global education policies. This week, Helga Fasciano, Special Assistant for Global Education, North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, shares their process, lessons learned, and advice.

"Through the Global Education Challenge, we hope to find truly original ideas that can become tangible tools to improve student outcomes across the globe--both inside and outside the classroom. We're building a community of innovators who share our goal, and together we'll discuss ideas for groundbreaking solutions to help transform student learning, foster family engagement, and enhance teacher effectiveness. We'll be giving away $250,000 in cash and prizes to the best ideas. Entries will be accepted from Thursday, May 19 through Friday, July 15th, 2011."