On the Road to Kinale
To get to the town of Kinale — a small settlement of mud huts and brick-and-mortar blocks situated in the high country along the Western edge of the Great Rift Valley in Kenya, East Africa — one must negotiate four miles of evergreen-forested terrain, the distance between the Nairobi Highway and the village itself. This negotiation is abetted by an unnamed road connecting the two points, a dirt track that can, at least in the brief dry season, accommodate, along with the plentiful bicycles and ubiquitous humans on foot, actual cars, a rare mode of travel in this poor, rural...
The Longest Extra Time
Jill Tucker sat quietly in a bar, watching the World Cup match unfold on the TV with everyone else, when a man sitting nearby addressed her: “You were my teacher.” Tucker had served the Peace Corps in 1990, teaching English for two years in the Capital of Cape Verde, Praia. Thirty-five years later, Ivan, a student in her class, wound up at the very same bar that night, watching the World Cup, too. When Tucker finished her Peace Corps service in 1992, there was no video call or social media to keep her connected to her students or the friends...
Back to the Solomons
On September 6, Peace Corps Acting Director Christopher Landau and Solomon Islands Minister of Foreign Affairs and External Trade Rick Houenipwela signed a bilateral country agreement in Honiara to formally reestablish the Peace Corps program. The agreement renews a partnership that once brought more than 700 Volunteers to communities across the country and that has remained dormant since the program was suspended in 2000. The first new group of Volunteers is expected to arrive in early 2028, initially working in education. Peace Corps staff and the Solomon Islands government will spend the intervening period identifying communities where Volunteers can contribute...
Paper Flowers: What We Do With the Time We Are Given
Some lives are measured in years. Others are measured by what they leave behind. For Shalin Shah, a young Indian American whose Peace Corps journey was interrupted almost as soon as it began, time would become painfully limited. But Paper Flowers, a feature-length independent film inspired by his true story, is not primarily interested in how Shalin died. It asks audiences to consider something much more difficult - and ultimately more hopeful: How did he choose to live? After graduating from the University of Southern California, Shalin traveled to Peru in 2015 to begin training with the Peace Corps. Service...
Peace Corps to Politics
When President John F. Kennedy challenged Americans to serve communities around the world, he envisioned more than just two years of Volunteer service. He believed Peace Corps would shape generations of leaders committed to building stronger communities, both abroad and at home. Today, that vision continues to unfold as a growing number of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCVs) step into public office, carrying the lessons they learned overseas into city halls, state legislatures, school boards, and beyond. For many, running for office is not a career change; instead, it is the next chapter in a lifelong commitment to service. The...
The Next Peace Corps Mission: Peacebuilding in America
Americans watch in anguish as our nation sinks deeper into a crisis of politicized contempt and violence. As a people, we share far more common ground than is portrayed by the vitriol of many political leaders and media voices. So how can we reverse America's plunge into self-destructive division? Global experience shows that societies can heal enmity and violence when ordinary citizens join together to work across divides. Americans are already pursuing thousands of local projects to restore civility in public discourse and manage conflicts peacefully. But we must vastly expand this work of peacebuilding, and the nearly 250,000 Americans...
Peter Pan Syndrome
From the air I view the Congo river, a muddy, meandering waterflow whose breadth where it separates Brazzaville from Kinshasa is truly impressive. Though I first came to Africa twenty years before, such names still captivate me even if I can now lecture on the difference between Congo-Brazza and Congo-Kinshasa, between Guinea-Bissau, Guinea-Conakry, and Equatorial Guinea. Though I graduated college without knowing the difference between Niger and Nigeria, I have since written books about them. And still, a journey through Africa excites me as much as my original atlas explorations did as a boy. All thanks to the Peace Corps....
RPCVs Addressing the Development Aid Gap
The idealism and optimism that gave birth to Peace Corps 65 years ago live on in the Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV) community and have never been more needed. With drastic international aid reductions, RPCV programs can be a critical source of support in marginalized communities. In the Yumbe District of Northern Uganda where two RPCV programs have expanded over the last six years people do not have water or electricity but what they do have in abundance is optimism. With the help of affordable loans from TCP Global, they move from selling on mats in the hot sun to...
Carrying the Torch of Liberty
Here in the Washington, DC area, where public service, education, and community roots run deep, we understand the quiet impact one life can have. My father, Victor Joseph Corbin, is one of those lives. As part of the Peace Corps’ earliest pilot program under President John F. Kennedy, he served in Costa Rica in the early 1960s. He didn’t observe from a distance. He immersed himself fully, working alongside local families, helping build infrastructure, teaching English, and becoming part of daily life. He didn’t just serve the community. He became part of it. That mattered. In the early 1960s, during...
Wave of Inspiration
When thinking about the legacy of Peace Corps, we as a community often cite with pride John F. Kennedy's speech at the University of Michigan in 1960, where the idea of Peace Corps was first articulated, and the astounding reception his call to service received when more than 1,000 young Americans signed a petition in support of the idea and offered to join up. "How many of you who are going to be doctors are willing to spend your days in Ghana?" Kennedy asked. "Technicians or engineers, how many of you are willing to work in the Foreign Service and...