Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Antes de Salir (Before Leaving)

To start, I'll explain how this whole thing started:
  1. An M.B.A. alum from the University of Maryland decided to offer an internship in Microfinance with his company, Prisma Microfinance, offered to Maryland business students.
  2. Dave Wilmes, the director of the fellows programs and clubs at the R.H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland, sent the executive board of our club (the Global Business Society) the internship posting to be a "Junior Loan Officer" at Prisma de Honduras.
  3. I submitted my application for the internship and received the placement!
That being said, I think anyone reading this should understand a little bit about microfinance. Microcredit is a concept that advocates giving small loans to entrepreneurs who are too poor to receive loans from traditional banking institutions. In Honduras, I will be working with an company called Prisma de Honduras S.A. The company gives loans from $50 - $15,000 for a variety of purposes ranging from starting a business to buying a car. Prisma has a partnership with an organization called Kiva. At Kiva.org, people around the world (like you!) can loan their own money to individuals who need it. The concept is really revolutionary and puts a face onto every loan given through the site. Here's the link to Prisma's page on Kiva http://www.kiva.org/about/aboutPartner?id=118. I encourage you to check it out!

As for what I will be doing...I'm not 100% sure at this point but I know I will be working with the Kiva project (probably inputing data into Kiva's database and writing descriptions of the people receiving loans) and processing loan applications using Prisma's loan module. Finally, I will be "based" in Tegucigalpa (the capital) but will have the opportunity to travel to their other offices around Honduras.

Other than that, I leave in two days on the 30th. Once there, I'll stay with a family in "Tegus", hopefully do some great sight-seeing, and, if I'm lucky, a bit of salsa dancing! Oh, and I almost forgot, lots of practice with my Spanish :).