Our Partners
Our Partners
Accion San Diego
The mission of Accion San Diego is to help expand opportunities for low to moderate income men and women through the provision of small loans. Loans range in size from $300-$50,000 and are coupled with individualized business consulting services. Accion offers very flexible qualifications for loan recipients, however it is required that entrepreneurs must live or work within San Diego County.
CDC Small Business Finance
CDC Loans offers both fixed-rate, low-down payment loans for the purchase of office and industrial buildings as well as a focused community loan program targeting women, minorities and veterans owning small businesses facing difficulty securing capital. CDC Loans champions its success to its ability to deliver unique capital “solutions” and strategizing with the client to assemble the most beneficial financing product. Loans range in size from $20,000-$500,000.
Foundation for Women
Foundation for Women is a locally founded organization working to empower women through the provision of small loans. The microcredit program seeks to raise female entrepreneurs traditionally deemed “unbankable” to higher rungs on the economic ladder through loans ranging from $250-$1,000. The Foundation for Women follows a traditional group lending model and holds weekly meetings to instill more successful repayments.
IRC San Diego
IRC San Diego is a refugee resettlement agency dedicated to humanitarian relief around the world and working in the San Diego area to directly resettle displaced persons into the community. The microenterprise department at the San Diego office is one of two in the nation giving business loans to resettled refugees from across the world. Loans range in size from $2,000-$15,000 and offer flexible repayment terms.
http://www.rescue.org/us-program/us-san-diego-ca
Point Loma Nazarene University - Center For International Development
The Center for International Development at Point Loma Nazarene University exists to apply life-affirming business principles and practices to the complex challenges of global poverty. We place a particular emphasis on social enterprises that address areas of economic and social development. We provide students with resources and connections to engage in development projects abroad via internships, job opportunities, study abroad, and service trips. We assist students, faculty, and staff to attend and participate in conferences related to global poverty alleviation and social entrepreneurship.
The Center For International Development or PLNU’s Microfinance Club
Via International
Via International programs address the basic needs of communities by building the capacities of community members to become agents of positive change. The community members in turn create opportunities for themselves, their families, and their communities.
Via International has been working in the border region for over 35 years. Experience has shown us that successful community development must include and promote economic development and sustainability. As one of our program participants has stated: “I know what to feed my children, I need more income to provide for that”. To assist in fulfilling this need, Via International supports micro-credit programs in Mexico and San Diego. Community Development is a participatory process through which community members identify community needs and organize themselves to take the actions necessary to improve their quality of life.
Grameen Foundation
Grameen Foundation helps the world’s poorest, especially women, improve their lives and escape poverty through access to microfinance and technology. With a footprint in 36 nations, Grameen Foundation is able to identify local needs and share best practices and lessons learned to enhance and expand local programs that move women from poverty to financial self-sufficiency.
- We build large scale, easy-to-replicate solutions to end the cycle of poverty in developing countries around the world.
- We leverage the knowledge and expertise of local partners to create the most effective programs possible
- We lead the industry in measuring impact and delivering results
University of San Diego (USD) Center for Service Learning 
Through service USD’s Center for Service Learning engages students, faculty, staff, and alumni to learn in partnership with the community and make lifelong commitments to promote social change.
Project Concern International
Project Concern International’s mission is to prevent disease, improve community 
health, and promote sustainable development. Motivated by our concern for the world’s most vulnerable children, families, and communities, Project Concern International (PCI) envisions a world where abundant resources are shared, communities are able to provide for the health and well being of their members, and children and families can achieve lives of hope, good health, and self-sufficiency.
University of San Diego (USD) School of Business
USD’s School of Business is committed to developing socially responsible business leaders with a global outlook through academically rigorous, relevant, and values-based education and research.
http://www.sandiego.edu/business/about/
La Maestra
It is the mission of La Maestra to provide quality culturally and liguistically competent health care and educational programs to improve the overall wellbeing of families in need. La Maestra also extends small business loans of $250 to women entreprepreneurs in San Diego county to begin their microenterprises. The loans are administered using the group lending model.
Women’s Empowerment International
Women’s Empowerment (WE) is a San Diego-based 501(c)(3) organization that partners with
non-profit microfinance institutions to provide microfinance loans and business services to women in poverty. Current partners include Grameen de la Frontera in Sonora, Mexico, Adelante Foundation in Intibucá, Honduras, and its latest venture with WomensTrust, an established microfinance institution in Ghana that makes loans to the very poorest women to help them start or expand small businesses. WE also founded and supports the WE Center for STAR Women in City Heights with the International Rescue Committee. The STAR Center provides free start-up business consultation, services and loans for refugee women.
Women’s Empowerment International STAR Center 
The WE Center for STAR (Support, Training and Assistance to Refugee) Women is a business incubator in City Heights that enables refugee women to start businesses, augment their families’ incomes and reduce or eliminate dependence on public assistance. The STAR Center, started in 2006, is a partnership of Women’s Empowerment International and the International Rescue Committee. It provides intensive one-on-one technical support, targeted group trainings, business skill building and access to grants and microfinance loans in a culturally sensitive setting.
University Of California San Diego (UCSD) - EPTEAM
EPTEAM (Eliminate Poverty Through Education and Microfinance) is an action-oriented group dedicated to combining the benefits of education and microfinance with the goal of breaking the cycle of poverty for impoverished people. We all share the same passionate desire to cultivate an awareness of poverty’s issues and concerns and to help others in their desire to succeed in a life free from poverty.
