Name: Iryna Lytovchenko
Age: 28
Education: Bachelor’s degree in economics from National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, master’s degree in international information at Institute of International Relations Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, MBA from MIM Kyiv Business School
Profession: Co-founder of Tabletochki, adviser to acting head of Ukraine’s Health Ministry
Did you know? Iryna Lytovchenko, who started swimming only about a year ago, swam across the Bosphorus Strait in July.
Iryna Lytovchenko, the co-founder of Tabletochki, a Ukrainian charity fund that helps children with leukemia, says that her team has brought the culture of “convenient charity” to Ukraine.
The charity’s website features one-click options for donating, and the organization teams up with businesses to run promotions in which part of a payment for goods or services goes to Tabletochki.
“We’ve managed to avoid piling on the agony … (and) appealing to conscience,” Lytovchenko explains. “We’ve made charity non-toxic, convenient — we’ve made it possible for people to be able to help wherever they go.”
Tabletochki was launched in 2011 as a volunteers’ initiative and officially became a fund in 2013. Since then, the charity has raised more than $3.3 million, according to the fund’s latest report.
“People have started becoming used to charity,” Lytovchenko said. “Now students organize charity concerts, kids don’t buy flowers for their teachers but give the money to charity instead, people take part in charity runs. It’s normal to help, it’s healthy.”
The motto of Tabletochki is: “It’s easy to help,” so Lytovchenko and her team give people options to do so without changing their lifestyles.
“You can help even sitting in your chair, you can live your life and increase the amount of goodness,” she said. “You can send money in one click, you can order your favorite meal, and help, you can buy some goods you need, and help.”
Tabletochki is “one of the first funds in Ukraine that managed to grow from a volunteers’ initiative into a whole organization, without the help of patrons, and one that really impacts the treatment of patients with cancer,” she said.
Lytovchenko, a member of AIESEC, an international youth organization, has been a volunteer since 18, and lived in Kenya and India for three months, teaching English. Later, working in PR, she met Tabletochki’s founder, Olya Kudinenko, in 2012, and joined her. After three years, Lytovchenko became a staff member of the fund.
Having been an adviser to acting Health Minister Ulana Suprun for a half of a year, Lytovchenko is leaving Tabletochki’s team to take a job in Ukraine’s Health Ministry. She will be coordinating donor assistance, and says Ukraine’s health system needs lots of work.
“There are people who have corrupt interests, but most people have never been told how else they can work,” Lytovchenko says. “The ministry’s team teaches civil servants to work differently. They teach doctors to change their attitude to how they treat patients, that a patient has a right to choose, to ask questions.”
