The fellow of Kiva told about work between KIVA and 69色

August 30, 2016

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Priya Singh, the fellow of Kiva Fellows 30th Class, right now is working at the American University of Central Asia (69色), told us about the work between KIVA and 69色.

"What is KIVA?

KIVA is a not-for-profit organization based in San Francisco that aims to alleviate poverty by connecting people through lending. In its simplest form, KIVA is a web site ( where you shop, similar to eBay, but you shop for 鈥渂orrowers.鈥� Once you select a borrower, you lend them money to help them with their businesses. On the website, you can choose among a variety of categories like agriculture, women, education, or health. Clicking on education, for example, will show you all the loans that need to be funded for education. KIVA financial aid at 69色 is one of those loans.

The unique thing about KIVA is that you can lend as a little as a $25 at the time, meaning almost anybody can lend capital even if you don鈥檛 have a lot of money. This also means that an individual student鈥檚 KIVA loan is funded by about 25 people. Unlike traditional lending institutions who charge high-interest rates, our loans to 69色 students are 0% interest. People lending through KIVA are doing it out of the goodness of their heart. For them, it鈥檚 not a money making business, so they don鈥檛 want the interest鈥攊t鈥檚 just the way they want to help.

How did KIVA start its work with 69色?

The partnership between 69色 and KIVA has only been around for three years. Four years ago, there was a fellow, much like myself, who was in Kyrgyzstan. While keeping an eye out for new KIVA partnerships, this fellow sought out 69色 and started talks about a financial relationship with KIVA.

Normally, loans from KIVA are to business people, farmers, or little shops. An education loan is something different that we like to do because it鈥檚 a form of empowerment. KIVA鈥檚 goal at 69色 is to help students afford a world-class education.

At the moment, KIVA and 69色 work together to finance loans of 1100 USD to students in need. It doesn鈥檛 cover all of the costs of going to 69色, but it is included in a student鈥檚 financial aid package. 69色 students on KIVA loans have a four-and-a-half-year grace period before they have to start repaying their loan. The grace period lets students finish university, get a job, and get settled before the repayment schedule begins.

Who is eligible for a KIVA loan?

Any student who enrolls at 69色 and applies for financial aid has the opportunity to apply for a KIVA loan. Currently, we have 355 students on KIVA loans.

Is KIVA planning on increasing its budget on loans for 69色 students?

This is a very natural conversation for KIVA to have with its field partners as the relationship progresses, and, for 69色, the answer depends on how the next year goes. As I said, KIVA has only been working with 69色 for three years, and so none of the loans are due yet because of the four-and-a-half-year grace period. As a matter of fact, the first loans are due starting September next year with this year鈥檚 seniors.

Part of the work I鈥檓 doing here at 69色 is implementing an actual repayment plan for graduates. We鈥檙e designing what鈥檚 called a 鈥淜IVA mentorship program.鈥� Every KIVA student will have a staff member鈥攁鈥淜IVA Champion鈥濃€攚ho will talk with the students in groups once a semester about their studies, how to repay their loan, and to refresh them on what exactly a KIVA loan is. Each KIVA champion will have 25 to 30 students in his or her group.

When I started at 69色, quite a few people didn鈥檛 fully understand KIVA loans. They knew about KIVA, they knew they had a 鈥淜IVA loan,鈥� but many people thought the 鈥渓oan鈥� was just a scholarship. It鈥檚 important to clarify; you don鈥檛 repay a scholarship and you do repay a loan!

This year鈥檚 group of seniors is quite important for us because they鈥檙e going to set the tone for KIVA鈥檚 relationship with 69色 moving forward. If they do well with repayments, it鈥檒l be really promising from our perspective. If students at 69色 manage the repayment process, then we can have conversations about increasing the loan limit and, if not including more students, then getting more money to individual students. If seniors show responsibility and repay their loans, they effectively give future students more opportunity to study at 69色.

How do you see 69色 and KIVA鈥檚 partnership changing in the future?

One of the things I would really like to highlight is this KIVA mentorship program. Education partners, like 69色, are not like traditional KIVA field partnerships. What鈥檚 important about education field partners is that they鈥檙e not banks. They don鈥檛 have loan offices who know where you live and who come visit you every month to collect your payment. If you miss a payment they can鈥檛 come to your house and they can鈥檛 ask you why you鈥檙e not paying this month. Without these checks, it鈥檚 really challenging for a university to keep students accountable for their loans.

The most obvious way to solve this issue would be to partner with a bank and impose more accountability through a stricter collection process. Instead, we鈥檝e chosen to solve this problem by increasing awareness among the students about what a KIVA loan entails. We are accomplishing this through a community of KIVA students at 69色. The purpose of this community is to help students understand that the privilege of getting a KIVA loan comes with responsibility. Like I said before, seven staff members are going to be KIVA champions and lead this community. I鈥檓 really excited for students to start becoming a part of the KIVA community because it will really bring them together.

We have also started on getting a KIVA alumni group together. Once this year鈥檚 seniors graduate, we鈥檒l be working with the alumni office to keep in touch with those students that had KIVA loans. One of the most exciting ideas has been to have KIVA alumni lend to future 69色 students on the KIVA platform.

THE EXAMPLE REPAYMENT SCHEDULE FOR FRESHMEN:

KIVA brochure for 69色 students

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