Grad students help Guatemalan NGOs attract potential donors via the Web

Two master’s degree candidates in economics are on a mission to make the world a better place, starting in Guatemala, where a multitude of non-profit organizations are seeking donors and resources to help develop their country.

Justin Podbielski, CLAS ’07, and Maura Williams visited Guatemala last summer as volunteers. They were struck by inefficiencies in the development community, where individual non-profit organizations sometimes compete for the same resources or are unaware of the activities of other non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

At first, they saw this as an academic problem — this is what happens in the non-profit community when there are no profit incentives to govern your actions.

Then they realized that the reputation of an NGO functioned as an incentive. The more information potential donors have about an organization, and the more transparent the NGO is, the more likely donors are to support it.

“If you improve the information flow, you can use access to information as a way to improve the flow of donations,” Podbielski theorized.

That’s when the problem moved them to action. They found a solution in a familiar tool: the social networking web site Facebook.

Using Facebook as a model, and with the help of Conrad Akier, a computer programmer, they created a central web site to expose organizations in Guatemala to donors and volunteers in North America and Europe, where 90 percent of their support originates.

During the past six months, they have contacted 400 agencies in Guatemala and are working with them to fill out surveys (in English and Spanish) about their organizations and create profiles on the new web site. The site is known as Many Efforts, One Goal, or MEOG (www.manyefforts.com).

They’ve enlisted help from computer science and engineering and business students at UConn, who are using the project as an academic exercise in computer programming and business planning. They’ve also sought help from the Intellectual Property and Entrepreneurship Law Clinic in registering MEOG as a tax-exempt organization.

Last week they held an information session on campus, seeking students to intern or work with MEOG as computer engineers, translators, marketers, grant writers, and recruiters. They hope to bring student interns to Guatemala next summer.

Although MEOG’s work is now in Guatemala, the two hope to expand to the rest of Latin America. They recently spent a week in El Salvador, making initial contacts.