Earlier this week, Tschetter dropped by our offices to visit about the corps. He talked about facts and figures — the 8,000-plus volunteers, a 37-year high; his push for financial accountability ("We should be 100 percent accountable for every penny."); the 180 languages taught by the corps; the 139 countries Peace Corps has served since inception (he's visited 38 of them in the past year and a half); the 16 predominantly Muslim countries the corps is working in now ("I think this is a face of America they need to see, for obvious reasons.").
Tschetter in Minnesota
A Face Of America / Minnesota has been connected to the Peace Corps since before President John F. Kennedy even established it in 1961. The current Peace Corps director is Ron Tschetter, a longtime Minnesota resident who graduated from Bethel University in St. Paul and still has a home around here. Between a two-year Peace Corps stint in the 1960s and his leadership of the agency today, Tschetter was an executive in the investments business. In 2006, he was nominated to lead the Peace Corps, was confirmed unanimously by the U.S. Senate and now reports directly to President Bush.
In remarks for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee before his confirmation, Tschetter said: "Growing up in South Dakota, I learned at a young age the value of hard work and serving others. Despite the difficulties of farming on the parched South Dakotan soil, my mother and father were prime examples of generosity. ... Those images of assisting others, regardless of our own circumstances, were ingrained in me and my six siblings at a very young age — and have never left."
Earlier this week, Tschetter dropped by our offices to visit about the corps. He talked about facts and figures — the 8,000-plus volunteers, a 37-year high; his push for financial accountability ("We should be 100 percent accountable for every penny."); the 180 languages taught by the corps; the 139 countries Peace Corps has served since inception (he's visited 38 of them in the past year and a half); the 16 predominantly Muslim countries the corps is working in now ("I think this is a face of America they need to see, for obvious reasons.").
He also talked about the Peace Corps' "50+" initiative — an effort to deploy older volunteers as well as those in their 20s. What counsel would he have for grayhairs who want to join?
"Stick with it," he said. It takes longer for 50+ volunteers to clear the health screening, and new-language skills come a little more slowly. In addition, older volunteers thinking about a two-year commitment in a far-off land have some big decisions to make about assets and proximity to children and grandchildren. "It's not for everybody," he said.
Those it is for, though, project a generous, hard-working picture of the United States in countries that invite it. That's important, he said, as is the awareness of other people and places that volunteers — and, we might add, directors — bring back home.
