Goodbye frankenchickens + Americans live longer + India electrifies + plastic cleanup
Optimists Club Newsletter #1
Welcome to the Optimists Club Newsletter, part of Granite Goodness. We share optimistic stories of progress, innovation, and problem solving from across New England— and in this edition, from around the world!
HAPPY SUNDAY EVERYONE!
So excited to bring you the very first OPTIMISTS CLUB newsletter.
First, I cannot thank each and every one of you enough. Many of you are friends of mine, colleagues, former coworkers or professors, or just great people— all of whom have gone out of their way to materially support Granite Goodness, or gifted that capacity to someone else special in your life. I hope to make you proud, and maybe even a little more optimistic.
Lots going on in Granite Goodness land but above all I hope to see you all at our next LIVE SHOW on Feb 20, at 3S Artspace in Portsmouth. Use code GRANITE for a discount!
Also save the date— there is going to be a meetup on Tues March 17 at Treeline Outfitters in collaboration with our friends at Give and Gather.
If you haven’t already, please fill out the Optimists Club intake info so I can show you off to the world and send you a print newsletter if you like. Reply to me here with any questions!
Now onto the news.
It’s rough out there. We all see it. The news is always dark by nature, but maybe it’s a bit extra dark lately. It even prompted me to write something this past week if you’re curious.
My vision for this newsletter is less a thorough recitation of global progress (done better by others), and more of an inside window on what personally is giving me the most hope and optimism lately. I read a lot of progress journalism, so I’ll share some of my favorite stories here, along with highlighting some of you great people.
This community is very wonderful and organic, if you have any ideas don’t hesitate to reach out. I am already scheming with some of you ; )
Since this is the very first edition of this newsletter, I thought I’d open by echoing my favorite mantra from the very smart people at Our World in Data, who publish world-class freely accessible research on all the biggest problems. It goes like this:
#1 The world is awful.
#2 The world is better than it used to be (in a lot of ways we can measure).
#3 The world can be better than it is now. Way better.
These three statements are true at the same time— they don’t contradict each other!
We’re constantly surrounded by examples of #1. It dominates our feeds and headlines. What we encounter far less often are stories of #2 and #3.
A core insight of solutions journalism is that when our attention is monopolized by #1, we unintentionally reinforce it.
Similarly, giving more space to #2 and #3 helps create more of #2 and #3.
In a nutshell, that’s what we’re trying to do here at Granite Goodness. So here is a nice dose of #2 and #3 from around the world.
OUR TOP GLOBAL PROGRESS STORIES THIS MONTH
#1: India is electrifying its growing economy at a faster rate than other developing nations before it.
When you compare India today with China at a similar income level in 2012, the contrast is striking: solar already supplies about 9 percent of India’s electricity, coal use per person is less than half of China’s was. This is part of a wider trend of nations decoupling economic growth from carbon emissions.
#2: US life expectancy reaches all-time high
This seems to have largely happened because so many fewer people are dying from opioid overdoses. Our very own Mark Lefebvre helped engineer such a decline here in New Hampshire & Maine.
#3: The Ocean Cleanup Project has increased its impact by more than 100x within the last 7 years
Founder Boyan Slat now estimates they intercept 2-5% of global plastic pollution, “slated” to increase (sorry). So many people told this guy it couldn’t be done. He seems to have proved the doubters wrong. There is still obviously a great conversation to be had about reducing plastic pollution in the first place, but I welcome the existence of the cleanup tech and capacity.
#4. Despite disruptions, 2025 saw astounding progress on the elimination of diseases
This was not a year in which you would expect to see such outcomes, and yet, countries made meaningful global health gains, eliminating several deadly diseases, expanding vaccines, and preventing millions of malaria and measles deaths. The global reduction in deadly diseases is one of those areas where there is massive good news and very little awareness of it in America.
#5: Norway is phasing out “frankenchickens” and moving toward in-ovo sexing
Norway announced it will fully phase out fast-growing “frankenchicken” breeds by 2027, becoming the first country to eliminate these high-welfare-risk birds from its poultry industry, affecting about 70 million chickens a year. As part of the transition, producers will also end the practice of killing day-old male chicks by adopting in-ovo sexing technology, which identifies male embryos before hatching, making this one of the most significant animal-welfare advances ever achieved at national scale.
Animal welfare is one of those huge, truly ugly problems we don’t often hear good news about, so this is a welcome development!
The person who deserves a lot of credit for bringing in-ovo sexing tech to the United States also runs a fantastic substack about applying tech toward animal welfare called The Optimist's Barn. His name is Robert Yaman, I spoke to him once, really nice guy!
There are endless progress stories all the time, but those are my favs from January. Now it’s time for our:
OPTIMIST FEATURE!
This month’s featured optimist (selected at random from club members) is…
Mandy Sliver!
“I joined the optimists club to support voices that lead with hope. In a world where negativity often feels louder and more powerful, the club affirms that optimism is not naïve or weak, but a deliberate choice our communities need more of.”
I actually had the pleasure of meeting Mandy at a Leadership NH event over the summer, and again at Radically Rural in Keene. She is quite the sunny human! You can find Mandy on LinkedIn, or over in Peterborough if you’re local to there.
Thank you for being an optimist Mandy : )
That’s it for this edition of the Optimists Club Newsletter. Hope to catch you all at the live show 2/20. We’ll be back tomorrow with the return of the Good News in New England Newsletter : )
-Andy
I loved this great snapshot of wonderful things going on in the world -we do really need it so thank you for brightening my day!!! You are the BEST! Mom
We need this good news! Thank you!