Sophie comes to her Kiva Fellowship with international work experience and a commitment to serving the underserved. She gained intercultural and training expertise serving at a non-profit program in Brazil, studying abroad as a Rotary Youth Exchange Student, and conducting research on social and cultural barriers to safe sex habits in Indonesia as a Critical Language Scholarship Participant. After being exposed first-hand to the effects of poverty in developing countries, she became interested in micro-finance while serving as a capacity-building intern for the Global Women in Management workshop put on by CEDPA in Washington, DC, where many of the participants were managers of micro-finance institutions around the world. She went on to serve as the Training Coordinator at Chrysalis, a non-profit in Los Angeles that works to alleviate poverty by helping low-income and homeless individuals secure stable employment, where she created and facilitated financial literacy and career development workshops. From this varied experience in the global non-profit sector, Sophie has become passionate about helping low-income populations achieve self-sufficiency, and is thrilled to support Kiva’s mission of alleviating poverty through micro-lending as a Kiva Fellow in South Africa and Mozambique.