Students team up with Helping Hands Project to help impoverished in Bolivia

SPRINGFIELD, Mo., June 18, 2007 - Drury University's Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team is known for helping others in need. After successfully implementing projects in communities within the U.S. and abroad – including Laredo, Tex., and Zambia, Africa – Drury SIFE has its eyes set on South America. Next week, Drury SIFE will travel to Bolivia – South America's poorest country – in an attempt to improve lives by teaching and demonstrating the concepts of free enterprise and ethics.

One member of the SIFE team, Chris Clutter, will travel to Bolivia with Project Helping Hands. This Oregon-based medical mission organization has been leading health care improvement efforts in the area since 2000. Clutter will meet with the former Bolivian Minister of Finance to discuss priorities and areas where help from the Drury team is needed the most.

Meetings will also be held with the leaders of nine different villages in order to implement more localized programs. Implementation of the water filtration system the team introduced in Zambia will also be introduced.

This trip is considered exploratory and the SIFE team hopes to determine exactly which projects would be most beneficial to the area in the coming months.

"I believe this project will help broaden the perspective of third world life by giving Bolivian citizens the resources to establish a much needed middle class in Bolivia," said Chris Clutter, project leader. "I have hopes that this 'humanitarian business mission' will become a model for other missions to even more third world countries. This is one of the many ways the Drury SIFE Team is changing the World."

Founded in 1975 and active on more than 1,600 college campuses in more than 40 countries, SIFE is a non-profit organization that works in partnership with businesses and higher education to provide college students the opportunity to learn, practice, and teach the principles of free enterprise. For more information, please visit www.drurysife.com.