MTSU Student to Intern in Bangladesh

An MTSU student leaves this week for an internship in Bangladesh, where he’ll observe efforts to fight poverty while experiencing it firsthand.

Senior Steven Sibley will intern at the Grameen Bank, which makes loans as small as thirty dollars so extremely poor people can start local businesses.

The model, called microfinance, is the brainchild of Muhammad Yunus, who taught at MTSU while earning his PhD at Vanderbilt. Two years ago he shared a Nobel Peace Prize with the Grameen bank, which he founded.

Sibley says he plans to try living on two dollars a day for a week, and may keep it up longer if it goes well.

“I have a friend who went to Peru for two years to do microfinance, and I told him I was going to Grameen to intern, and he was like, ‘You’re learning from the guru, from the guy who started the model.’ So I’m really excited at the opportunity there, and I also always keep in mind that which doesn’t kill me only makes me stronger.”

Sibley is headed to South Asia on a scholarship provided by former MTSU economics professor Kiyoshi Kawahito.

Kawahito says he wants students to experience international poverty. He says America’s poor would be considered middle-class in Bangladesh.

“The average life standard of American people is so high that they can hardly understand the struggle – the despair of what we call poor people in these regions.”

Kawahito plans to make the scholarship annual, with different locations each year.