Kristina Owens

Board Member

Member-elected (Current term ends 2015) — Mid-Atlantic/Nationwide region

Bolivia 2000-2002

Email

Kristina is part of a Peace Corps Family along with her Dad, Robert (Bob) Peru 1970-1973 and her identical twin sister Wendy, Paraguay 2000-2002. While serving as a Natural Resource Peace Corps Volunteer in Bolivia, she was also a student in the Loret Miller Ruppe Peace Corps Master’s International Program in Forestry at Michigan Technological University.

She served in the small town of Las Carreras in the province of Sud Cinti and the department of Chuquisaca. She taught both English and Environmental science to 7th through 12th graders. Her Master’s thesis project/secondary Peace Corps project was on the genetic diversity of the cherimoya fruit tree. She interviewed farmers and collected cherimoya fruit and seeds from three distinct farming communities throughout Southern Bolivia.

Kristina is currently a Biologist with USDA Animal Plant Health Inspection service. She develops molecular tests to detect for diseases in foreign plant germplasm at the National Quarantine Center in Beltsville, MD. Her other interests include training and capacity building of both domestic and international scientists and policy makers on various molecular tools; USDA’s Feed the Future initiative; and Food security issues including the use of alternative crops such as the Cherimoya, one of the Lost Crops of the Incas.

Kristina has served on the Board of the Returned Peace Corps Volunteers of Washington, DC since 2009 as Treasurer, Strategic Partnership Director and RPCV/W’s Peace Corps 50th Anniversary Liaison/Event Manager. She and RPCV/W’s 50th Anniversary Leadership committee organized the RPCV/W community in the planning of three keystone Peace Corps 50th Anniversary events on September 25, 2011: JFK Wreath laying; Arlington program and the Walk of Flags.


176 queries in 2.442 seconds.