Viewpoints and Ideas on Development & Peace Corps

I just read an interesting blog post from Devon with the Mali Health Organizing Project in Sikoroni, Mali:

http://devongola.blogspot.com/2009/01/ambiguities-of-peace-corps.html


Devon offers an honest assessment of Peace Corps from the perspective of a development worker who is not a Peace Corps volunteer. Her overall assessment is that despite many positives Peace Corps is not successful as a development organization. It seems that her primary reason for believing this is the lack of experience of volunteers.

If you've read my first post, you can see some of my own views on Peace Corps agree with Devon's, although I am much more optimistic about the importance and future of the organization. The main point that we agree on is the lack of volunteers' preparedness to fulfill the 1st goal:

• Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.

Most of the men and women joining the Peace Corps are not well enough trained or prepared for what they will encounter. Most volunteers are fresh out of school and spend almost half of their service learning the language and the culture, so they don't bring the right skills necessary to make a lasting impact in sustainable development.

Devon suggests that Peace Corps needs to change its structure and be more selective in choosing volunteers. In my earlier post I asked those same questions, but I'm still not convinced that is the only answer. Of course, in an ideal world all Peace Corps volunteers would be experts and well trained for their service, but I fear that setting standards too high might affect the positive impact Peace Corps is able to make towards its other 2 goals.

One idea I've had (it might not work or maybe it exists already, but I'll throw it out there anyway) is to create a better system of support for volunteers, but to do so in a creative way that doesn't have to get stalled in the bureaucracy of a government institution. What if there existed a way for volunteers in the field to link up with experts in the US and for those experts to serve as mentors to the volunteers in the field. Communication technology has come a long way since I left Mali in 2004. Cell phones are everyone, Internet is more available, digital cameras and flip video are widely available.... What if there was a LinkedIn for the development world or some similar social network where people with technical experience can collaborate with people on the ground. RPCVs who now have experience could link back up with their host communities and current volunteers to continue to make an impact toward the 1st goal. Who knows, if you can prove a mentoring model, maybe you could get Peace Corps to treat the mentors as volunteers themselves and finance trips to host countries to help with major projects. But I don't think one needs to wait for Peace Corps to change. Why can't we change Peace Corps? Maybe someone else is doing this already? Maybe the National Peace Corps Association has it in the works already? I haven't found it yet, so maybe I'll start something. Anyone takers?