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Maximize the Impact of $25: Become a Kiva Fellow

February 4, 2010

Love Kiva? Want to do more on the ground? We are looking for qualified people who want to get into the field to help make the connection even stronger.

Kiva Fellows are short-term volunteers who work with a specific Kiva field partner for three months or more. They help to bridge the gap between Kiva lenders and our field partners throughout the world sending stories and data back to Kiva HQ and the lending community. Kiva Fellows possess travel experience, language skills, enthusiasm for Kiva, and a flexible personality – all of which allow them to conduct field work that strengthen connections between stakeholders in order to alleviate poverty.

Last week, Kiva hosted trainees for the tenth class of Kiva Fellows here at our headquarters in San Francisco. This class will be heading to 51 field partners in 31 countries. In the two years that the Kiva Felllows Program has existed, we have sent 254 fellows from 25 different countries to every country in which Kiva operates except for Iraq. Take a look at the map below for KF10.

(light green denotes fellows trained in KF9)

The Kiva Fellows Program is a vital and strategic asset to Kiva in fulfilling its mission. The fellows are an adaptable, scalable and sustainable resource to innovate at Kiva. Kiva Fellows have helped our field partners to utilize Kiva’s lending platform more effectively and efficiently to enable the organizations rapid growth and to get more funds from lenders to entrepreneurs.

We are still accepting applications for KF11 as well as future classes. We encourage you to apply. For more information and our online application please go to www.kiva.org/fellows