Enactus Empowers Honduran Community

For the second year in a row, Enactus (formerly SIFE) has traveled to Honduras to partner with World Gospel Outreach in efforts to empower local business leaders to make a difference in their communities.

Dr. Bryan McKinney, dean of the Hickingbotham School of Business, Dr. Brett Powell, vice president for administrative services, Justin Young, project leader and a junior business administration major, Judith Brizuela, Enactus president and a senior psychology major, and Claudia Brizuela, a freshman business administration major were among the group that made the trip to Honduras.

Enactus made its first trip to Honduras last January, which allowed the group to build a relationship with the people in the area and learn how to partner with World Gospel Outreach. The group implemented a different strategy on this year’s visit.

“We had two major purposes for this year’s trip,” Young said. “First of all, we taught financial classes to a couple of small business owners who had never had formal classes. We taught them basic budgeting, accounting principles, and even some basic small business fundamentals. The second purpose of this trip was to explore the options of how Enactus could better partner with World Gospel Outreach to market and sell their Honduran, mountain grown coffee.”

While McKinney and Powell made the trip down to Honduras, they allowed the students to teach the bulk of the material to two local carpenters in hopes of spinning them out into a self-sustaining business of their own.

“Dr. Brune (assistant professor of finance) had helped our students prepare PowerPoint slides and materials for these Honduran carpenters,” McKinney said. “Dr. Powell and I were the fall back plan to train them, but the students completely taught them on their own so that was a neat opportunity for the students.”

The group initially planned on being in Honduras on Sunday, Jan. 13 through Tuesday Jan. 15 but weather delays caused the group to miss their connecting flight in Houston,  only spending one full day in the country.

“The organization we were working with was so flexible and worked with us to change the schedule up and we were still able to accomplish everything we were supposed to accomplish,” McKinney said.

The group also felt that this trip helped them to understand the world using a different set of lenses and has given them a chance to serve others.

“Any international trip always plays a huge role in the formation of your views on the world,” Young said. “This trip, for me, opened my eyes to how fulfilling pouring into someone is. More specifically, it opened my eyes to how I could use the talents God has blessed me with to help empower other people.”

“It was incredible seeing how much the small business owners appreciation for the classes we taught them. They explained how much this would affect their business and help them in the long run. Ultimately, they wanted to better provide for their families by growing their business. It was an awesome experience getting to play a part in this.”

Young believes that future endeavors to Honduras are a real possibility, hoping to continue their work of partnering with World Gospel Outreach and building up local small business owners.

“We are hoping to be able to go back down with a larger set of curriculum and material to teach to a larger group of small business owners in and around the Tegucigalpa, Honduras area,” Young said. “We want these classes to be something that can be duplicated and taught by other people to other people.”

For more information about Enactus, contact Young at you48532@obu.edu, Brizuela at bri48350@obu.edu, or assistant professor of accounting and faculty sponsor Dr. Jim Files at filesj@obu.edu.