For the past 11 years college students have been learning about foreign countries first-hand through Students of the World, a non-profit organization that aims to raise awareness about global social issues.
The Boston team of Students of the World includes one member from Boston University, five from Harvard University and one from the University of Texas.
This June the team will travel to Ghana to film a documentary about daily life and current issues concerning microfinance and private loans that affect the country’s rural population.
“We are hired to create a documentary in the month of June about how people are using these loans and how their lives have changed,” said College of Communication junior Alex Osherow, the Boston team’s development coordinator.
Sarah Luberano, a Harvard sophomore, and the team’s assistant filmmaker, said the team is working with Opportunity International, a non-profit organization that aims to reduce poverty.
“Opportunity International works in rural areas of Ghana to help set up banking, give out loans for private schools and act as a safe place to store money,” Luberano said.
Luberano said banks in Ghana have more trust in women than men when considering loans.
“They give about 85 percent of their loans to women,” Luberano said. “Men tend to spend the money on alcohol and cigarettes.”
Mobile banks have been adopted by Opportunity International to extend credit to those with restricted access to banks in the agriculture-based country.
“They have a large armored vehicle that drives from village to village and people use their fingerprints to access bank accounts,” Luberano said.
Osherow said that Opportunity International aims to help farmers who would not otherwise have access to financial services.
“Their goal is to reach the people that banks usually wouldn’t and help them to get out of poverty,” Osherow said.
“We’re going to be in a different location every week,” Luberano said. “We’ll be interviewing a lot of cocoa farmers and seeing how loans helped them make a profit on their agriculture.”
This Saturday, Students of the World is having a fundraiser at Tommy Doyle’s pub on Winthrop Street in Cambridge from 2 to 5 p.m, Osherow said. Admission is $5 to see several musical performances, and all profits go to Students of the World. Several bands will be playing.
There will be another fundraiser on April 16 at Sweat and Soul Yoga at 1032 Commonwealth Ave. from 2 to 3:30 p.m. and entrance is $10.
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