Kennedy grad battling world hunger

Eliminating global hunger is a daunting, seemingly insurmountable task that will require the joint efforts of countless people and organizations around the world to coordinate and organize and fight together. In the midst of this effort is Merrick native Daniel Bornstein, who considers himself a hybrid –– simultaneously a scholar and an activist.

Bornstein, 19, who graduated from Kennedy High School in Bellmore, is studying environmental anthropology at Dartmouth College, and as a member of the Dartmouth Coalition for Global Health, the soon-to-be sophomore is spearheading an effort to organize students for the 1 Billion Hungry Project.

“I want to understand the political policies that cause social inequity,” said Bornstein, who was a Bellmore and Merrick Herald student columnist while at Kennedy. “And I also want to build a movement and reform some of those poor policies.”

His unrelenting focus on the relationship between agriculture and the fight against global hunger began while he was at Kennedy. “The 2008 global food crisis is what really got me interested in agriculture,” Bornstein said. “I kept reading about the rising price of food and the resulting riots in more than 30 countries. I ultimately wanted to find out why the global agriculture situation was so precarious.”

As part of Kennedy’s Advanced Science Research Program, Bornstein tackled issues of international significance. His first project explored methods to reduce farmers’ dependence on fertilizer and irrigation, and as a senior, Bornstein conducted research on the possibility of using the poplar tree as a biofuel alternative to corn-based ethanol.

“He was a real doer,” said Barbara Franklin, a Kennedy chemistry teacher and ASR mentor. “He was interested in agriculture from a scientific and political aspect. That’s what set him apart. He wanted to learn about the cause from both sides. That’s a different kind of thinking from most high school students.”

After graduating from Kennedy as salutatorian of his class and editor of the school newspaper, the Cougar Crier, Bornstein was accepted to Dartmouth, and his passion for the cause to end world hunger only grew.