As you might have seen in previous posts, my 7th grade daughter is looking for a community service project idea for a class at school. Tonight, we explored Kiva, a microlending organization that gives small loans to people mostly in developing nations to help them start a business, receive education etc. I've made five donations to date, and the idea is that the people I donate to pay back the $25 I lend them over time. You can read their profiles, track their progress, and when the loan is paid back, you can re-loan that money to another deserving group or individual.
In the past, I've participated in two team efforts within Kiva, too. One is for Google Certified Teachers and the other was started by Karl Fisch of the Shift Happens video fame. I checked these teams statistics tonight and was floored by the amount of lending from these groups that still continues to happen, even though the teams were formed a few years ago. Very inspirational!
So I decided I'd make a team for us here in the Global Education Collaborative. Let's see what we can do to make a difference. My daughter and I are now exploring ways to make a team for her school which may be problematic as most 7th graders are not 13 yet. I'm thinking we can do this with her school community by promoting it as a family activity. Julia and I really enjoyed looking through the profiles, teams and map on Kiva, and Julia remarked that she didn't even know where some of these countries listed were located. Well, she's going to learn as we become more active with Kiva, and I'm very excited about the opportunities to help others help themselves.
Please join me and other GEC members by participating in our team. It's a great way to figure out how Kiva works and determine how it could be used in your classroom. Think about the service learning opportunities!
Attached are some screenshots of my portfolio, and stats from the two aforementioned groups.
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