News
40 Senators Sign Annual Peace Corps Funding Letter
40 Senators signed the annual Peace Corps funding Dear Colleague letter, urging support for the president's FY 2025 request of $479 million for the Peace Corps. By Jonathan Pearson Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD), the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and fellow committee member Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), have sent the annual Peace Corps funding Dear Colleague letter to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee for State/Foreign Operations. The letter urges support for President Biden's request of $479 million for the Peace Corps – an eleven percent funding increase – for the fiscal year that begins next October 1st (FY 2025)....
111 House Reps Sign Annual Peace Corps Funding Letter
The annual House Peace Corps funding Dear Colleague letter is now closed, but not before 111 lawmakers demonstrated their support. By Jonathan Pearson On Thursday, April 25, RPCV Congressman John Garamendi (D-CA), and fellow Congressman Garret Graves (R-LA), the Co-Chairs of the House Peace Corps Caucus, began circulating the annual Peace Corps funding Dear Colleague letter. This year’s letter to the House Appropriations Subcommittee for State/Foreign Operations, urges support for President Biden's request of $479 million for the Peace Corps for the fiscal year that begins in October (FY 2025). This would represent an eleven percent increase over...
The Stream
WorldView selects its favorite media across channels, and invites you to share yours at [email protected] Scroll Down to See: FILMS PODCASTS BOOKS FILMS: Stranger at the Gate (The New Yorker) Our Great National Parks (Netflix) Retrograde (National Geographic) Occupied (Netflix) All the Light We Cannot See (Netflix) PODCASTS The Empty Grave of Comrade Bishop (Washington Post) Awake at Night (United Nations) War and Peace (International Crisis Group) Do We Get to Win This Time (The Ringer) On Peace (U.S. Institute of Peace) BOOKS: King: A Life (MacMillian) Poverty, by America (Penguin Random House) Some People Need Killing (Penguin Random...
Diary of a First-Time Advocate
An hour-by-hour account of NPCA’s National Day of Advocacy on Capitol Hill By Flavio Cabrera 8:30AM It is a windy morning when I arrive at our Peace Corps meeting point in an old church located two blocks away from the Supreme Court and the Capitol building. Ever since I moved to Washington D.C., I am continuously amazed and humbled by our nation’s magnificent venues. When I arrive at the church, I am impressed by the large number of former Peace Corps Volunteers who, like me, had served our country in previous years. Everyone I greet is kind as we share experiences...
Black History Month: Interview with RPCV Carla Brown-Ndiaye
Fueled by a curiosity of people, cultures, and international travel, RPCV Carla Brown-Ndiaye shifted from a budding career in human resources to serving as a teacher in the Comoro Islands — along the way deepening her respect for cultural perspective. Interview conducted by Tiffany James In celebration of Black History Month, we honor the crucial role that Black Peace Corps Volunteers, staff, and communities have played globally throughout Peace Corps' more than 60-year success story. We proudly spotlight a Black RPCV whose journey of service and self-discovery transcended borders. After working in human resources for a few years after...
20 Years Strong: National Days of Advocacy
NPCA celebrates two decades of advocating for a stronger Peace Corps By Jonathan Pearson Since its founding 45 years ago, National Peace Corps Association (NPCA) has been the constant, leading voice for our community when it comes to supporting and improving the Peace Corps and its thousands of serving and returned Peace Corps Volunteers. Starting in 2005, this work included the establishment of our National Days of Advocacy to coincide with the beginning of Peace Corps Week. Our primary kick-off activity is an in-person Capitol Hill Day, held close to March 1, the anniversary of President Kennedy’s establishment of the...
Q&A: Retrograde
A conversation with Emmy Award-winning producer and RPCV Baktash Ahadi by Robert Nolan Baktash Ahadi (Mozambique, 2005– 07) is an award-winning filmmaker, human rights activist, TEDx Speaker and RPCV. His latest film, the Emmy Award winner Retrograde, offers a first-hand account of the controversial U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the human toll the war has taken on Afghans and Americans alike. Below is a condensed and edited conversation Ahadi had with WorldView editor Robert Nolan. Robert Nolan: When I watched the film there was a particular scene when the Green Berets are breaking the news to their Afghan counterparts about...
Rallying Point
NPCA’s Continuation of Service program makes volunteering easy—and accessible—for RPCVs by Eva Sundgrenz Peace Corps service instills an ethos of growth through giving back that still drives Returned Peace Corps Volunteers today. Volunteerism is declining across the United States, according to Philanthropy News Digest, but RPCVs understand the personal enrichment that comes from service done right. We have firsthand experience of the profound fulfillment offered by meaningful volunteer opportunities with visible community impact, versus passive acts such as signing petitions or donating money. In the current social and political climate, we must keep this distinctive spark of service alive by...
Engineered for Consumption
A new opportunity for RPCVs to help deliver clean water, sanitation and hygiene to rural communities by Mary Ostrowski Most people in the developed world would agree with the statement “Water is life.” After all, our hands, lips, food, clothing, and household surfaces come in contact with clean, safe water multiple times a day. How could we exist without it and still be healthy enough to maintain our daily activities? We couldn’t. Most of us have never needed to try. Poor-quality water equates to a suboptimal life, one at significant risk of poor health, poverty, and hopelessness. Water Engineers for...
Putting the Peace in “Peace Corps”
My experience in East Timor taught me how Volunteers participate in peacebuilding by Dan Baker Peace Corps has played a significant yet often unrecognized role in global peacebuilding, the focus of this edition of WorldView. Current conflicts around the world, especially those occurring in countries where many of us have served, are heartbreaking to follow and devastating to our families, counterparts, and communities. At NPCA, our unequivocal goal is to help counter the forces that drive conflict by supporting the deployment of greater numbers of Peace Corps Volunteers to serve (safely) in developing countries where war has existed in the...