By Chandler Brandes

When Ben Belknap ’06, ’16 first arrived in Tanzania in 2007 upon graduating UofL, he had no interest in becoming a doctor.

Fast-forward to present day, and Belknap is a UofL Medical School graduate and is currently finishing up residency in Brooklyn, New York after previously earning a bachelor of Science in Sociology from the College of Arts & Sciences.

His interest in the field of medicine was first peaked during a 2 year stint in Tanzania with the Peace Corps. Inspired to join by a friend, Belknap became the first-ever volunteer in the village of Kingiti in the Dodoma region. Upon moving to the East African country, he lived with a family to become fully immersed in the culture and attended language lessons where he became fluent in Swahili.

“The villagers would come to my little house and assumed I would help them with any sort of medical ailment,” Belknap said.

Four hours off the paved road, the village of Kingiti had no medical facility and Belknap noted the lack of diagnostic clarity and testing in rural East Africa. In a village of nearly 3,000 people, there were only four water taps that ran for a few hours each day.

Motivated to continue making a difference in the small village, Belknap teamed up with UofL sociology professors Angela Orend and Patricia Gagné to create the Kingiti Fund, a 501(c)(3) non-profit. The organization has two primary focuses: The Kingiti School Scholarship and the Village Health Outreach Fund.

In a population made up entirely of subsistence farming households, Kingiti families often cannot afford to send their children past the equivalent of middle school. It only costs $250 annually to take care of each student for rent, food, room fees, and tuition, according to Belknap. The organization currently has 73 scholarship students.

The non-profit also provides emergency medicine training for Tanzanian doctors and nurses in district and regional hospitals. They established the first emergency room in one district and have partnered with the Emergency Medicine Association of Tanzania to expand their reach.

The non-profit is also planning to extend their education and emergency medicine projects into other regions. “We have a lot of projects going on right now. We are in a moment of growth, and we’ve had so much luck with this,” Belknap said.

He has returned to Tanzania five times since first living there as a member of the Peace Corps and said his experiences there have made him more grateful. As the Kingiti Fund continues to grow, one thing is certain – Belknap will continue to make a difference in the lives of those in the village he once called home.

Interested in donating to the cause? More information can be found here, and stay connected with them on Facebook!