''Every Monday morning in Hpa-An, Karen State, students and teachers at the Education Gathering Group (EGG) Academy gather to usher in a new week. Together, they sing the school song, pledging to become “guiding stars of the community,” before beginning a full day of classes. The subjects: English, social science, community development, numeracy, and learning skills. The total number of students: 78. Their ages: 16 to 24. After two years, they will graduate with a diploma in Community Development and Leadership. Outside of school hours, students participate in service-learning trips, join activity-based clubs, and can be elected to student government. They also complete a three-month internship in one of EGG’s partners, which can refer to a local organisation or an INGO. EGG demands a lot of its students. Besides a packed schedule, students confront a syllabus that demands critical thinking, teamwork, and conversational English, subjects which appear foreign to the majority of students that have completed Myanmar’s infamously rigid government school system.[1] There are also the demands of a world distant from the villages they grew up in. EGG’s students mostly come from rural backgrounds, predominantly from remote townships in Karen State, but sometimes from further afield including Tanintharyi, Ayeyarwaddy, and the Thai-Myanmar border. A residential component is therefore central to EGG’s mission, with the majority of students staying in on-site dormitories. Attending EGG can take a toll on students’ families. Students speak frequently of how proud they were to have achieved the “highest education” in a family of school-leavers; equally frequently, they admit to feeling guilty for their inability to contribute to household incomes as they continue their studies, placing a higher burden on their siblings and parents at home...''