A Better Peace Corps

FRESH NEW IDEAS

As life-altering as the Peace Corps experience is, many former volunteers, staff and host nationals, feel there is unharnessed potential and a need for greater flexibility.  With President Barack Obama's call to service and campaign pledge to double the Peace Corps, we have a once in a generation opportunity to revitalize the program we all love and respect so much.  At the start of this campaign, over a thousand former volunteers were interviewed by MorePeaceCorps staff and interns to compile ideas for revitalizing the Peace Corps in the 21st century. 

Here are just some of the ideas we heard:

• A much stronger and bigger Peace Corps Response Team (formerly Crisis Corps).  More opportunities for doctors, engineers, and other needed professionals to complete short stints over longer periods to meet critical needs in developing countries.
• More joint degree programs and student loan forgiveness.
  
• Creative partnerships with other international volunteer sending programs, micro-credit groups, and NGOs and businesses that want to help, just to name a few of the possibilities.  More teamwork. 
• Major investments in water, agriculture, and public health projects.
• More robust training programs that teach Peace Corps volunteers how to install water pumps, put in solar panels, and set up health posts, just to name a few possibilities.
• More structured opportunities for returned volunteers to bring the world home.

Better, Bolder Peace Corps Survey

In October, 2009 more than 4,500 individuals took part in a Better, Bolder Peace Corps survey to assess if any key issues had particular resonance among a broad section of the Peace Corps community.  Read the report, which was shared with Peace Corps leadership and key policy makers on Capitol Hill.

CONTINUE ON TO “A BOLDER PEACE CORPS” >