"The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable." But would Peirce serve again? "The answer is 110 percent yes," she said.

Peace Corps Online: Directory: Turkey: Peace Corps Turkey : Web Links for Turkey RPCVs: "The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable." But would Peirce serve again? "The answer is 110 percent yes," she said.

By Admin1 (admin) on Friday, July 06, 2001 - 1:34 pm: Edit Post

"The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable."



"The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable."

"The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable."

But would Peirce serve again? "The answer is 110 percent yes," she said.

Cornellians who have served in the Peace Corps: 1,207 and counting

Stefan Cherry, campus Peace Corps coordinator and a graduate student in international agricultural development, holds a mask he brought back from his six-year volunteer service in Cameroon. Robert Barker/University Photography

By John Wilson '98

Walter Renfree already knows what he will be doing once he graduates in May with a bachelor's degree in agricultural, resource and managerial economics. After an intensive summer Russian language course, he is going to teach business and marketing classes as a Peace Corps volunteer at an institute in western Russia.

"It's not what you usually think people in the Peace Corps do," Renfree said, adding that the two-year-long experience will be a challenging one. It was less than seven years ago that the Soviet Union collapsed, its socialist experiment having failed. The states that emerged have since been trying to refashion their economies in the image of capitalism, but the Marxist-Leninist tradition remains securely established in the minds of many, including some of those Renfree will teach.

Renfree will be joining a select group of 1,207 other Cornell graduates who have served in the Peace Corps since its inception in 1961. Cornell ranks 11th among all colleges and universities producing Peace Corps volunteers and is one of only two Ivy League universities in the top 25. Harvard University, with 1,966 volunteers, ranks fourth.

Renfree, who studied at the Cornell Abroad program in Geneva last year and is fluent in French, said Peace Corps service will help him decide if he wants to pursue a career in teaching and is an opportunity for him to apply his knowledge in a way that might benefit others. "An altruistic mission seems to be lacking in the capitalist system," he said.

A desire to assist others while gaining international experience and foreign language proficiency is the chief reason students investigate volunteering for the Peace Corps, according to Stefan Cherry, Peace Corps coordinator at Cornell and a graduate student in international agricultural development. "Students I see who apply for the Peace Corps feel they've been given so much and want to give something back," he said.

Similar aims motivated Cherry himself to become a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon from 1991 to early 1997. He worked as an agroforestry extension agent, showing farmers how to plant trees and shrubs to enrich soil, prevent erosion and provide firewood.

One of the most satisfying experiences he had there came when he revisited a farmer he once worked with. The farmer held a "field day," inviting 50 other farmers in order to demonstrate to them what he had learned about agroforestry. "It was rewarding to see that what I did wouldn't stop with one person but would have a greater impact," Cherry said.

The distinction between "teacher" and "student" or "assistant" and "assisted," however, is far from absolute. "Peace Corps volunteers learn more than they impart to those they go to help," said Robert Blake, professor of animal science, who served in Peru from 1968 to 1971. When a visitor asked him recently if he was the only volunteer in his village, he responded, "Yes, there's no reason for the ignorant to congregate."

"It's one way to teach a child to swim," he continued. "You toss him off the dock and hope that he's not afraid of the water." Blake, who studies cattle, said that his stint in the Peace Corps introduced him to new cultural mores and ways of living life and established his subsequent interests. In short, he said, "It was one of the greatest adventures of my life."

Volunteers provide services in 87 countries in the fields of education (38 percent), the environment (18 percent), health (17 percent), business (13 percent) and agriculture (9 percent).

"Areas we really need people in include agriculture and nutrition, and Cornell has been a great provider for those," said Peace Corps recruiter Janet Getchell, in a telephone interview from regional headquarters in New York.

With Congressional approval, there could be more openings in the Peace Corps for the 9,000 individuals who applied in 1997. In his weekly radio address Jan. 3, President Clinton pledged to ask for a $270 million Peace Corps budget for 1999, an increase of 21 percent, which would allow the number of volunteers to rise to 10,000.

Peace Corps volunteers are divided about equally among three world regions: Africa, 37 percent; Latin America and Oceania, 33 percent; Europe and Asia, 30 percent. On average, volunteers are 29 years old, and 93 percent are single. Members of minority ethnic groups make up 14 percent of the current 6,500-volunteer force, which is 58 percent female.

"There were absolutely equal expectations in the Peace Corps," said Leslie Peirce, associate professor of Near Eastern studies and a volunteer in Turkey from 1964 to 1966. "Women were not given cushy assignments. It was such a remarkable thing for me, since I'd never had a female professor and didn't know any female doctors or lawyers."

Peirce taught English in a junior high school in the city of Gaziantep, just north of the border with Syria. Despite political tension between the United States and Turkey, Peirce said that she always felt like a guest and was invited into peoples' homes quite frequently. She specifically mentions the Peace Corps when she introduces herself in her courses on the history of the Ottoman Empire, since her time in Turkey influenced her entire career.

As with nearly any experience, there is room for criticism. "The Peace Corps was not well-handled in Turkey," Peirce said. "More people were sent in than were absorbable." But would Peirce serve again? "The answer is 110 percent yes," she said.

"I'm glad it wasn't what I expected it to be," said Julian Kilker, a graduate student in communication, reflecting on his time teaching physics and English in Kenya from 1987 to 1989. "In contrast to the stereotypes, it's easy to live without running water and electricity. It's harder to develop personal relationships," he said.



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This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Turkey; Special Interests - Peace Corps Over-expansion

PCOL2677
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By cengiztaylan (88.245.240.240) on Monday, July 09, 2007 - 5:27 pm: Edit Post

I would like to have the adress of Mary Dargitz who had been physical therapist and peace corps woluntaries in turkey .city of Erzurum in 1964 _1966 She had married to David spidel; who was in army


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