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Program Parameters More schools are adding microfinance components to their curricula as standalone courses or segments of other classes. To make sure such initiatives are successful, administrators might keep this advice in mind: Begin with a single course or modest goals. Most schools don't have the advantage of Tufts University, which just received a $100 million endowment from eBay's Pierre Omidyar to start a microfinance program, or the University of Mary- land, which received $6 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to assess the impact of microfinance grants. "Unless you get a big donation to fund the pro- gram, it makes sense to start small," says Edwin Brands of the University of Iowa. Reach out to everyone. "Involve as many people as pos- sible—not only in your school, but also in the local com- munity," says Brands. "Then you can generate more buzz about your program." The Iowa professors described their India trip to community leaders and local businesspeople, who donated small grants to help defray the costs of travel. "I think people in the community can appreciate microfi- nance because many of them started small or have been in situations where they needed loans to get them past the next month," says Brands. Plan visits to microfinance organizations. "A good microfi- nance program really needs to have a hands-on compo- nent," says Andrea Wuerth of Lehigh University. "I don't think you understand microfinance or believe it's possible until you see it. A microfinance program should allow stu- dents to do internships, act as consultants, or just go on fact-finding trips." Take advantage of your assets. A school with a strong finance program should incorporate microfinance into that curriculum; a school whose strength is global citizen- ship could tackle microfinance from that perspective. Says Wuerth, "Lehigh's traditional strengths are technology and engineering, so technology was a key part of the project we undertook in Honduras." Make friends. "It helps to have a connection to a micro- finance institution," says Brands. "Cultivate a relationship with a nonprofit, or a foundation, or even another univer- sity that already does work in this area." Wuerth agrees; Lehigh planned its trip to Honduras using the connections already in place through programs run by the anthropol- ogy department. Look for an advocate. "Initiatives in academic institutions rise or fall depending on the presence or absence of a fac- ulty champion," says Ronald Chua of the Asian Institute of Management. A motivated faculty champion can promote the microfinance agenda and win the support of others— in the business school, the university, and the community. 28 BizEd MAY/JUNE 2007 Chris Baxley, an Owen Graduate School of Management student (seated at right), distributes a microloan to a local villager in Sadhashivpet, India, as part of Project Pyramid, a new cross-campus initiative at Vanderbilt University aimed at ending global poverty. the departments of geography and international studies at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. "Some organizations want people who have already started a business. Others focus on people they determine through some method to be poor. It can all be very political. You see Muhammad Yunus give $100 to someone who needs a micro loan; but then you realize that other efforts at microfinance are done in a culturally specific context by different people with different motivations." Different approaches obviously lead to the potential for a wide variety of b-school programs, or at least the inclu- sion of microfinance concepts in a number of spots in the curriculum. "It can be part of finance, or entrepreneurship, or basic economics, or even ethics," says Wuerth. "We're incorporating microfinance now in our socially responsible investment class." At Harvard, Chu and his colleague, professor V. Kasturi Rangan, include microfinance in their courses "Business and Base of the Pyramid Markets" and "Effective Leadership of Social Enterprise." As microfinance evolves, Chu expects it to be covered in courses on banking and financial services, particularly those servicing emerging markets, as well as in courses that discuss business and low-income sectors. "For business to be successful in low-income sectors it will require an infrastructure that is very different from infra- structure in businesses at the top of the pyramid," Chu says. "You could say that everything that applies to business also applies to low-income business—marketing, production, dis- tribution, and so on. But the key thing to know is that mar- keting in low-income sectors is very different. Production is very different. So is distribution." NAT ROBINSON