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...
Closing the Door to Humanitarian Immigration
Over the past year and a half, drastic changes in government policy have affected millions of immigrants living in the United States, as well as countless others who held hopes of entry. These developments have impacted not only those who aspired to study or work here, or secure greater opportunities for their families, but also refugees and asylum seekers—survivors of violence and persecution in their home countries, hoping to find safety here in the U.S. On the first day of his current term in office, Donald Trump initiated what the New York Times has called “the harshest crackdown on immigrants...