While many friends knew that I had applied for the Peace Corps, I hadn’t shared it “publicly” – i.e., on social media. I was still working and wasn’t ready for folks at work to know that I was planning to leave relatively soon. But, I had joined a Facebook group of PC volunteers over 50. After my application was withdrawn, I posted my disappointment there. I received some nice support, and, to my surprise, a message from a recruiter who had served as an “older” volunteer. In talking to the recruiter, he strongly encouraged me to keep at it, I just needed to find the right position.

So, I did what I do when life gets rough, I analyzed the information at hand. Three things were limiting my options: countries I was medically eligible to serve in, language requirements (not speaking Spanish), and my areas of interest (agriculture and environment). In my analytic mind, I saw a Venn diagram – I didn’t actually draw one, but I did make a table, the next best thing.

Medical eligibility

Based on the extensive medical questionnaire that applicants fill out immediately after submitting an application, Peace Corps Pre-Service Medical determines which countries an applicant can serve in. This review is what initially removed Nepal from my list. In the last year, Peace Corps has revised the medical review process and considerations. Now my list of eligible countries is even shorter than when I first applied.

Sectors of Interest

One of the things about being an older volunteer is that I have a pretty clear sense of what I’m interested in and what is just a bad fit. And, I’m not willing to go with a bad fit. Been there, done that. I have a variety of interests, and I recognized that I’d rather be here in the US working at the local food bank farm than trying to teach English somewhere else – getting into Peace Corps is not everything.

Starting, with the countries I was medically eligible to serve in, I read the Peace Corp page for each country to see which had programs in the sectors I am interested in. I did add Community/Economic Development to Agriculture and Environment. The sectors I am not interested in are Health, Education, and Youth Development. This layer removed a number of countries: Botswana, Eastern Caribbean, Guyana, Kenya, Mexico, Mozambique, Rwanda, South Africa.

No Español

Next, I considered languages. While I speak German well (lived there twice as a student), that is not useful in Peace Corps countries. Nor is this little bit of Swedish I know. I was working on French, but do not know Spanish. I had the impression that for a country where the common language is French, PC is a little more lenient about language ability than for countries where the common language is Spanish; there are so many applicants that speak excellent Spanish, PC doesn’t need to be lenient to get good candidates. A few more countries dropped from the list: Columbia, Dominican Republic, Panama, Paraguay, and Peru.

The Short List

Suddenly, the list was very short. Only two countries remained: The Gambia and Uganda. But at least there was still a list.

I also knew that I if I learned some Spanish, that would expand my list. So, I stopped learning French and Duo and I started working on Spanish. I looked into local classes, but the schedules didn’t work for me.

At the same time, the Peace Corp process for opening back up was still unknown. So, Duo and I plugged away over the summer…

Picture

A blog post seems unfinished without a photo, so the cover photo is from a backpacking trip at Cutthroat Pass in the North Cascades as I waited. Because it was so beautiful and I couldn’t decide which photo to use, here’s a second one.