What We Heard: 10 Key Quotes from Day One of the Social Good Summit

“We need to change the world.” That’s the message we’ve heard over and over again today, the first day of the 2016 Social Good Summit. This two-day conference brings digital influencers, entrepreneurs, and world leaders together in New York around the United Nations General Assembly to discuss solutions to the greatest challenges of our time.

Today we heard from a dynamic and diverse group of speakers – including comedian and TV host Chelsea Handler, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, transgender advocate Jazz Jennings, DoSomething.org’s Aria Finger, UN Special Envoy Mary Robinson, balloonist Bertrand Piccard, and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry – on key topics of refugees, women in leadership, entrepreneurship, health, and climate change. The overarching theme: The world needs change, we have a plan called the Sustainable Development Goals, and we’re the ones that can achieve them.

Day Two promises to be just as good with speakers including U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and UN World Food Programme Executive Director Ertharin Cousin. Tune in at 11:30am on Monday, September 19 at mashable.com/sgs-livestream.

Here are 10 quotes from today to inspire you:

1. We need a global movement for climate justice.
   – Mary Robinson, UN Special Envoy for El Niño and Climate

2. It’s important to be loud. If you have a soapbox, stand on it, and scream.
   – Chelsea Handler

3. Universal health care is not just a medical issue. It’s an equality issue. It’s a justice issue. It’s an issue of priority.
   – Alaa Murabit, UN Sustainable Development Goals Advocate

4. We need your support, your pressure, your power to work for the global goals.
   – Richard Curtis, Project Everyone

5. There’s no doubt the plight of refugees is the greatest humanitarian crisis of our time.
   – Sherrie Westin, Sesame Workshop

6. It’s the spirit of innovation, of risk taking, of daring that we need now more than ever in the humanitarian world.
   – Ravi Gurumurthy, International Rescue Committee

7. There’s no excuse anymore not to care about issues around the planet.
   – M. Sanjayan, Conservation International

8. It’s critically important that refugee children be able to be children.
   – Carolyn Miles, Save the Children

9. When you get to the top, don’t drop the ladder. Help other women up, too.
   – Joyce Banda, Former President of Malawi

10. I think the best way to get people out of trauma is to give them hope for the future.
    – Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees

[Photo: Stuart Ramson for UN Foundation]