Spotlight: The Kiva Club

With a $2,300 grant, the HHS Kiva club has a lot to be thinking about.

“Our goal is to alleviate poverty around the world and we raise money in the community,” said  Katie Kadoun, junior and co-founder of HHS’ chapter of Kiva Club.

On Nov. 21, Kiva received this generous grant from the Hopkins Education Foundation. But it didn’t always start so easy.

At the end of the 2015-16 school year, Timothy Owen’s Spanish 4 class looked into the organization Kiva. Kadoun and Jane Nelson, junior, co-founder, took more of an interest in the topic, and decided to implement the organization’s goals at HHS.

“Kiva gives students an opportunity to make an impact on those big issues,” Nelson said.

Kiva is international non profit that uses micro financing to alleviate poverty and expand education around the world. At HHS, the club takes money via donations and loans it out in small portions, typically around $25. Micro financing helps to make it possible for multiple clubs to be able to loan to one person in need.

The KivaU website then helps direct clubs to where they want to loan. There are different activities the organization provides that are available for the club to use at their meetings. The website gets clubs started and explains Kiva’s vision and shows what other clubs have been doing.

“As Kiva Club, we collect donations from the student body and other groups, then that money goes into a fund and will accumulate over time as we give out loans and get them returned to us,” Nelson said.

The club meets Wed. mornings in Room W215. Though the club is mainly composed of juniors, they are looking for more student members. At each meeting, the club looks for who and what causes they want to loan to and then choose around 5 people. For Rafael Lewis, junior, the concept of Kiva is something that he believes in strongly.

“It’s important because some people aren’t as privileged like others, and aren’t born into a family like others, and need to work hard and need something to help get them on their feet,” Lewis said.

Getting the $2,300 grant was very important to the club. It began with the club filling out a concept application in early Sept. which stated the basic ideas of what the club is and what they will do with the money. Later, Kiva completing the final application on Oct. 10 asking the more elaborate questions receiving the grant soon after.

“It makes me specifically feel like there’s something I can do to help people around the world just from our community connecting HHS to the rest of the world so we can really make an impact,” Kadoun said.