Global Brigades is the largest student-led sustainable development organization in the world. What does that mean exactly? It means that Global Brigades brings together students in college, just like you, and coordinates task forces to help create stability in developing communities around the world. The brigades range from medical, to law/humanities, to business and all share the same slogan: Students Empowering Communities. Check out their 2013 achievements video on YouTube here.
The University of Utah Business Chapter is currently preparing for their upcoming trip back to Honduras in May. This Microfinance brigade spans seven days in rural communities that do not have the privilege of financial services or business guidance. Through the week-long process of working with the community and getting to know the locals, students find a new appreciation not only for the culture they are immersed in but their own culture back home. Day to day activities range from field work to small group discussions with community members on what they have been doing with the info last given to them by GBB- what is working, what isn’t working, and what they want to do next. Volunteers create memories that will last a lifetime, both with new friends in the brigade and new friends in the population being visited.
“I have had the amazing opportunity to be a part of Global Business Brigades for the past 3 years,” says Utah Chapter President Sierra Allen. “Traveling to Honduras and Panama to use the things I have learned in college to educate others, have truly been some of the most humbling experiences. Global Brigades is an amazing organization that is focused on empowering and educating communities to become self-sustainable, rather than giving them everything. I am so excited to return to Honduras to help empower another community and drive them to success!” Having traveled to both Honduras, which is almost fully self-sustainable thanks to GBB, and Panama, which is at the beginning stages of the self-sustainability program, Sierra has seen the good that her hard work has done. She encourages everyone to join and share this same experience. “You do not have to be a business major of any kind to go on a business brigade! There are medical brigades at the U too for students in the pre-med program.”
Last May, the University of Utah Global Business Brigades Chapter traveled to Panama and one member describes her first brigade experience as “extremely humbling.” Aimee also says the community was “extremely welcoming” to the brigaders and she “learned so much from this amazing experience.” Although the weather was not ideal and the bugs were quite large, her first brigade was a success and she fully intends on going again to see how the community in Panama has grown.
To find out more about what Global Brigades is all about, click here and search around their main website, donate to a brigade, or even fill out an interest form by clicking here!
To find out more about what the Utah Global Business Brigade specifically does, click here or follow them on Instagram @globalbrigadesutah.