The Kid Philanthropist – Jivteshwar Khaira

The 18 year old, Doing his best to make the world a better place. 

Jivteshwar Khaira, who was diagnosed with depression at the young age of 14, said that the experience of being in that dark place made him realize that his mission in life was to help other people, and so he started! 

His first project was raising money for the David Suzuki foundation to counteract the bad being done by climate change. He was successful in raising about $10,000 from friends, family and his personal contribution. Even though he admits that while the experience was instrumental in forming the man he has become, he quickly realized that he would do way more good with his own non profit organization! And so he decided he would start one. He filed the paperwork for the organization to be formed as soon as he turned 18, and through that he is continuing to try to make the world a better place.

While talking to Jivteshwar, we learned that he doesn’t believe in just throwing money at the problem, he truly likes to get his hands dirty and help with any situation that he can. In the summer of 2021, Jivteshwar spent time in India helping with the Covid crisis that had taken root in lower income neighborhoods. He organized groups and put together the funds to set up 22 free testing centres in northern India, along with 18 free vaccination clinics as a way to combat the pandemic. For this, he was awarded a commendation by the chief minister and governor of Punjab, and got to meet the prime minister

He is also responsible for the construction of about 18 schools in low income countries and communities, like Indonesia, Bali and Chad. He took time in the summer of 2020, to fund and build schools in Bali and Indonesia. He described the experience as “eye opening” and “worth it”. He says that funding education is “perhaps the most important thing that we as a species can do” 

I was impressed when interviewing the young leader as to how much he has accomplished in such a short time even with his health spiraling. We take time to applaud this young philanthropist and leader for all his work to make the world a better place. We also wish him the best with his further endeavours and hope he can inspire other young adults to do the same.