Philanthropy

Greg Mortenson is the son of a missionary who grew up in Africa where his father built a hospital for the people of Tanzania. Then, in 1993 after a failed attempt to climb K2, Mortenson met a village of people in dire need of a school where they could teach their children, especially their daughters. This led Greg Mortenson to co-found the Central Asia Institute, a NGO dedicated to the building of schools for the education of girls in Pakistan. In 1999, at the request of the remote Kirghiz people, CAI moved into Afghanistan.

Mortenson has devoted his life to the people of Pakistan and Afghanistan, often taking months away from his family in Montana to supervise the building of or begin new projects for CAI. Mortenson also wrote a book, Three Cups of Tea, that brought international attention to CAI and forced Mortenson to take more time from his...