Oprah Opens School for Girls

Oprah Winfrey has kept her promise to President Nelson Mandela and recently opened a school for disadvantaged girls, giving more than 150 students a chance for a better future, as reported by Canada.com.

"I wanted to give this opportunity to girls who had a light so bright that not even poverty could dim that light," Winfrey said at a news conference.

Mandela, 88, attended the opening ceremony of the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in the small town of Henley-on-Klip, south of Johannesburg.

"This is not a distant donation but a project that clearly lies close to your heart," said the anti-apartheid leader who became multiracial South Africa's first democratically elected president in 1994.

Singers Tina Turner, Mary J. Blige and Mariah Carey, actors Sidney Poitier and Chris Tucker, and director Spike Lee also were in attendance. Each guest was asked to bring a personally inscribed book for the library.

Winfrey has said that she decided to build her own school because she wanted to feel closer to the people she was trying to help.

The $40 million academy aims to give 152 girls from deprived backgrounds a quality education in a country where schools are struggling to overcome the legacy of apartheid.

Unlike several celebrities that have sparked the debate about child adoption in Africa, and what celebrities could instead be doing to help children in the region, it appears Oprah is among the few working to not just change one life but create change that will benefit generations to come.