education

A Different Kind of Revolution in El Salvador

by Maritza

Saludos Vittana community! My name is Maritza Trejo. I am your new fellow, based out of the Enlace offices in sunny El Salvador. Maritza with Enlace staff at Enlace offices. Over the last few months I have been working with our El Salvadorian field partner Servicios Financieros Enlace on the

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Higher Education: A Stepping Stone to Peace and Equality

by mjhunja

Just outside of my office at BancoFie is a poster that caught my eye on my first day of work as a Vittana Fellow. It says:“La Paz no es un obyecto encontrado por casualidad. Es el producto de la igualidad entre los hombres.” – -“Peace is not an object found

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Microfinance: Supporting the Future Leaders of Tomorrow

by sarneson
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 “What happens to Africa matters to the world.” – Patrick Awuah As a fellow in Ghana doing market research on the potential for an education loan I, along with my co-fellow Megan, have had the chance to meet some incredible people here. One of those we’ve met has been Patrick

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How Vittana Loans Are Empowering Entire Families

by kmunn
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The other day, I came across a what seemed like a strange clause in the policy for ASKI and Vittana’s pilot Loan for Educational Development Program (LEAP): Only third and fourth year students would qualify for a loan. I found myself wondering, what kind of impact are we making when

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Giving Back in 2011

by debagrin

We’re floored on a daily basis by students who have struggled against all odds to finish their education, lenders who time and again come back to change yet another person’s life, and Fellows who dedicate a portion of their own lives to bringing microloans to more students in developing countries.

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High Hopes in the Philippines

by Stefan Tangen
Pagalum Office

Hot, humid, busy, loud and exciting are good words to describe my experience stepping off the plane at the airport in the Philippines. My destination, you ask? A tiny, rural province called Misamis Occidental on the island of Mindanao, the second largest island of the Philippines. Everywhere I looked, constant

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Thank You for Creating a World of Opportunity

by debagrin

As I sit here on the day before Thanksgiving, what comes to mind is the over 250 students on Vittana right now who are poised to transform their lives by continuing their education. Whether it’s Omar Ahmad‘s desire to become a civil engineer in Jordan or Lidia Severina Aban‘s goal

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Believing in Human Potential

by Stefan Tangen
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I must admit I knew very little about the Philippines before I arrived. What I did know was that it’s an archipelago in South East Asia and the only Christian nation in Asia. I knew basically nothing about what the people, politics, economy or food was like. It was a

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Hello, From Your Fellow in the Philippines!

by kmunn

I would like to begin this blog entry with one of my favorite quotes: “Once in a while it really hits people that they don’t have to experience the world in the way they have been told.” Well, it ‘hit’ me at a very young age… Since the moment I

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From Ithaca to Illimani

by bzorner

Ithaca is a small town, home to around 30,000 people and Cornell University- which is situated on a hill above Cayuga Lake in Central New York. I spent the past four years studying Economics, Philosophy, and Psychology in this frigid island of academia far away from my home in sunny

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