Hundreds of students attended discussions and talks on helping others become self-reliant last week, as BYU hosted the Economic Self-Reliance Conference.
While hundreds of participants, mostly representatives from humanitarian and other service organizations, attended the conference, students also had an opportunity to attend several free events in conjunction with the conference.
John Hatch, founder of the village banking movement, a system that gives small loans to poor communities, spoke Friday, on the importance of students getting involved. Hatch gave students pre-emptive congratulations for being a part of the generation that will end extreme poverty - the kind of poverty that kills.
"There's no excuse for that in a planet with the resources we have," Hatch said, referring to severe poverty.
Hatch said if two million people donated $1 per day to loan to the poorest of the poor, a new village banking system could eliminate extreme poverty by the year 2025. He said individuals, not government, will have the power to accomplish this goal.
"Government doesn't know how, never has and never will end world poverty," he said.
The Net Impact student association hosted a discussion Thursday with Marty Jenkins, a social entrepreneur involved in programs to help poverty-stricken areas in Bangladesh and India. Jenkins spoke on some of his efforts and numerous ways that students can get involved in helping people come out of poverty.
"Net Impact is a club that encourages business students to use their business skills for social good," said Kiley Hunt, an MPA student from Bakersfield, Calif., and one of the club's co-presidents.
Jenkins mentioned microcredit and its role in helping poor families climb the economic ladder. He said some families and individuals are too poor to make any real use of microcredit, so other programs exist to help build people to the point that they can accept microcredit.
For example, some programs give families a pair of chickens to take care of, which they can use to breed more chickens or sell the eggs. This helps these people understand responsibility and helps them on the path to self-reliance, Jenkins said.
Jenkins said he didn't "get it" - the importance and meaning of humanitarian work - until about two years ago.
"All I want you to know is how desperately I wish when I was your age that I had gotten it," he said, addressing students.
Following Jenkins' remarks, four organizations with BYU connections gave presentations on their work in bringing about a positive change in different parts of the world in the Social Innovation Summit. The summit was a way to showcase what BYU students and alumni are doing to make a difference, said Jessamyn Lau, an MBA student from London, who organized the summit.
"Changing the world is easy," said Warner Woodworth, faculty advisor for the event. "All it takes is a dream, passion, blood, sweat and tears."
Presenters included Empower Playgrounds, an effort to bring power to rural schools in Ghana by installing playground equipment that generates power as children play on it, and School Tipline, a Web site that allows students to anonymously report bullying, drugs and violence by their peers.
One presenter, John Keller, whose for profit organization, Worldwide Book Drive, said businesses are often associated with greed and corruption, but it doesn't always have to be that way.
"Business is actually a great vehicle for change," he said.
Stephen Gibson and his wife Bette were honored as Social Innovators of the Year in the conference. They spoke about their Academy for Creating Enterprise - an institute that helps returned missionaries in the Philippines start their own small businesses - both at the summit and in a separate speech Friday. Gibson explained what makes up social entrepreneurship and social innovation.
"The difference between social entrepreneurs and regular entrepreneurs is a regular entrepreneur does it to make a profit and a social entrepreneur does it to make a difference," he said.
Copyright Brigham Young University 10 Nov 2008
