????財富網(Fortune.com)定期從網站“250字”(250 Words)挑選最引人入勝的短文、趣聞軼事和作者訪談。美國西蒙與舒斯國際出版公司(Simon & Schuster)開發了網站，旨在探討世界各地最新出版的商業佳作。

????Fortune.com selects the most compelling short essays, anecdotes, and author interviews from "250 Words," a site developed by Simon & Schuster to explore the best new business books—wherever they may be published..

????本期，“250字”的山姆?麥克納尼將與亞當?布勞恩促膝而談。亞當?布勞恩是足跡遍及全球200多所學校的非盈利機構“希望的鉛筆”（Pencils of Promise）創始人。布勞恩的新書《希望的鉛筆：普通人帶來非凡改變》（The Promise of a Pencil: How an Ordinary Person Can Create Extraordinary Change）于本周由Scribner出版社出版。

????For this installment, 250 Words' Sam McNerney sits down with Adam Braun, the founder of Pencils of Promise, an award-winning nonprofit organization that has broken ground on more than 200 schools around the world. Braun is the author of the new book The Promise of a Pencil: How an Ordinary Person Can Create Extraordinary Change, published this week by Scribner.

????麥克納尼：在《希望的鉛筆》開頭，你記錄了自己早期環游世界的旅程。每到一個國家，你都會問當地的一個孩子：“如果你可以要世界上任何東西，你最想要什么？”請跟我們分享一下，什么樣的答案讓你決定創建“希望的鉛筆”？

????布勞恩：最初決定環球旅行的時候，我希望把自己認為已知的所有東西拋在身后，敞開心胸去體驗我所接觸的不同文化。我在印度遇到一個乞討的男孩，對于我的問題，他的回答非常簡單但卻出人意料——他的回答是“一支鉛筆”。這個答案給我帶來的震驚難以用言語解釋。當時我便下定決心，給孩子提供接受教育的機會，比任何東西更能幫助他們挖掘自己的潛力。

????McNerney: In the beginning of The Promise of a Pencil you document some of your early travels around the world. In each country that you visited you asked one child, "If you could have anything in the world, what would you want most?" Tell us about the answer that became the impetus for PoP.

????Braun: When I initially decided to travel around the world, my driving force was the desire to leave everything that I thought knew behind, opening myself fully to experience the different cultures in which I was going to come into contact with. I encountered a young boy begging in India, and he had such a simple and unexpected answer to my question. His reply was "a pencil," and it struck me in a way that I cannot explain. I decided then and there that offering children the opportunity of education would help them reach their potential far more than anything else that they could be given.