By my right of free speech and freedom of the press, do I record my experience applying with the Peace Corps, for the benefit of those who blindly submit to their application process
Minority Watch: Peace Corps Recruitment
By my right of free speech and freedom of the press, do I record my experience applying with the Peace Corps, for the benefit of those who blindly submit to their application process!
The first time I applied to the Peace Corps was when I had just graduated with a civil engineering degree. I had several summers of relevant work experience such as the Forest Service, and working in construction. But as a woman and minority, I felt insecure. I loved the outdoors and was in the prime of my athleticism, yet I accepted it when my interview told me "You could use more experience." I had shown up to interview in a nice business suit, and I couldn't help feeling that maybe I had over-dressed.
The second time was after I passed my EIT, and had several years of work experience, again with the Forest Service and consulting firms. This time, due to parental illness, I didn't follow through with the application. The Peace Corps apparently frowns on "incomplete applications." I had just put my fingerprint forms away, and thought it no big deal. But the Peace Corps categorized me later as "rejected" because I had not followed through.
The third time I applied was approximately eight years later. By this time I was still single, unmarried, but had gained much worldly experience. I had spent my mid-thirties gardening, volunteering with various organizations, and working both as an engineer and at other times, holding self-supportive jobs. I wanted to pass the registration examination, yet I decided to apply with Peace Corps again anyway. The recruiter handed me the "Great Adventure" book to read. "We can talk about anything of interest you find in there," he remarked. BIG TRAP! I guess the only way I should have reacted was to throw the #@%!ed book away! These "Great Adventure" books are filled with short vignettes from the lives of Peace Corps volunteers. As such, they are incomplete, ranging from the impossible to the sentimental. For instance, one story may feature a young white woman having a fight with a local African man, others about young women handling marriage proposals, others about white males delegating to Africans just how they ought to dig their fishing ponds or irrigation systems. One notoriously awful story was about a community septic mound which washed out during heavy rains, written by the a young male volunteer who obviously hadn't much experience designing septic system mounds. Of course, after I read these stories, I do have issues to talk about. Can you guess the rest?
The Peace Corps recruiters are trained to be like two-bit actors and actresses. They put on some fancy clothes and play the part of a Tarzan and Jane who has returned from a 2-year stint in the jungles. These actors/actresses goad hopeful students, young professionals, and maturing careerists with lures of adventure, promising experiences, later fame and fortune, and future government jobs, yet what they dangle upon closer examination are canned, corporate sales shows, purposely devoid of any real information or facts. They rarely tell the truth because you are only a recruitment number to them, and should you demonstrate a desire to find out more facts, particularly with regard to sensitive, critical issues, you are penalized for being "too curious."
I should have been able to face these facts earlier on, but guess what? I applied to the Peace Corps a fourth time, just this year! By now I am a professional, and also taking classes at college again, presumably for career-enhancement, although I regard it as enhancement for life. I have paid off all my debts and then some, and I am still single and unmarried. I have no criminal record at least that I know of, and my car insurance rating is AA. I am still in tip-top physical condition, even though I am nearing the end of my child-bearing years. Don't you think that would make me a good candidate for the Peace Corps?
This time the Peace Corps did nominate me, and like so many other nominees, I was required to undergo the requisite complete medical, eye, and dental examinations.
No problem- I devoted a couple months and over a thousand dollars worth of tests and dental repair work took place. Here again applicants, beware! No matter what work is done, you only get $237 back, minus five dollars for the contracting agency fee.
I didn't think that was a problem because afterall, several returned volunteers told me there was only a 10% rejection rate.
And guess what? What with months and months of waiting (8-months all told), I was recently rejected again!
Of course the Placement Officer would not tell me any specific reason why I was rejected. But neither had she encouraged me to apply anymore (some recruiters say you can only be rejected four times), and worse, for all my efforts, she failed to even THANK ME for applying! She only indicated that my 10% statistic for rejected nominees was not true. Why do recruiters give this statistic then, I asked? Of course she became evasive, "We have talked long enough," she said.
The gray period, folks, between nomination and invitation is where it's all at. Your hopes, ambitions, financial loose ends, are all placed on hold, at the mercy of the Peace Corps. Meanwhile, all summer, the only information I received on Peace Corps from my recruiter was information about "Returned Peace Corps Volunteer" get-togethers, parties, lectures- all out of town.
Well, my recruiter did at least direct me to two websites, the official one, and peacecorpsonline.org Yes folks, peacecorpsonline.org is where all the real scary information is, but don't you dare repeat what you read back to the recruiter! For instance, this summer, I read about one young woman returned from Africa after she had been attacked by a rapist in the middle of the night, beaten literally across the face so that her teeth were knocked out. The horror story wasn't just the crime or the possibility that she had contracted AIDS: it was the fact that Peace Corps gave her the runaround when she returned to the US and sought reimbursement for medical treatment. And are there any statistics which the Peace Corps keeps on crimes, sickness or disease afflicting volunteers? You'd better not ask the recruiter because you'd be disqualified for your curiousity. They are not anxious to tell you- and I don't believe the statistics they provide would be necessarily true.
I know the Peace Corps can give people the runaround, because just yesterday I wanted to find out about appealing my recent rejection, and both times, the Peace Corps operator directed me to a phone answering machine, no name of contact or phone number extension offered.
The bottom line seems to be that applicants and nominees are just supposed to blithely believe that Peace Corps will "take good care of us." Yet why and how could we, when the whole process of selection is so ciruitous, ambivalent, and completely underscores an attitude of elitism?
I wonder if the best recruits for the Peace Corps aren't CIA interns, because only these types might have the callous, two-faced, hard-care attitude it takes to mercilessly capitalize upon some foreign accomplishments, afterwards returning to the US with the spirit that they did something which they can forever lord over everyone else.
Thank goodness I was spared such spurious egotism- and also my individual humble rice-bowl photo of myself in one of those cheap, shiny brochures such as the Peace Corps produces.
-Anonymous
http://www. peacecorpsonline.org
http://www.peacecorps.gov
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