November 13, 2005: Headlines: COS - Tunisia: Staff: Deputy Directors - Olsen: Columbia Missourian: Jody Olsen speaks at Missouri University
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November 13, 2005: Headlines: COS - Tunisia: Staff: Deputy Directors - Olsen: Columbia Missourian: Jody Olsen speaks at Missouri University
Jody Olsen speaks at Missouri University
Olsen shared her story and those of other Peace Corps volunteers with nearly 200 people gathered for MU’s second International Education Week Gala at Jesse Auditorium on Friday. Audience members included several returned Peace Corps volunteers from mid-Missouri who had served two years in countries such as Peru, Turkey, Kenya and Fiji. Last year, 30 new volunteers were recruited from mid-Missouri to go off to these and other countries. Jody Olsen, Deputy Director of the Peace Corps appointed by President George W. Bush, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Tunisia.
Jody Olsen speaks at Missouri University
International Week gala highlights Peace Corps
By MARIN DEVINE
Storytelling is the best way to relate to and respect other cultures, according to Josephine Olsen, deputy director of the Peace Corps.
“It was my stories, tumbling through and intertwined with those of my host family, my neighbors and my students that helped me find a place I could call home,” said Olsen of serving two years in Tunisia for the Peace Corps in 1966-68. “I learned how we could be so different and yet so much the same.”
Olsen shared her story and those of other Peace Corps volunteers with nearly 200 people gathered for MU’s second International Education Week Gala at Jesse Auditorium on Friday. Audience members included several returned Peace Corps volunteers from mid-Missouri who had served two years in countries such as Peru, Turkey, Kenya and Fiji. Last year, 30 new volunteers were recruited from mid-Missouri to go off to these and other countries.
Kacy Burg, who spent 2003-05 in Uzbekistan, chatted during intermission with Amy Spindler, who spent the same years across the border in Kyrgyzstan. The two women, who live in Columbia, enjoyed Olsen’s theme of stories. Burg recognized not everyone will join the Peace Corps, but that a common goal is to bring stories back home.
Cynthia Woodcock, originally of Sullivan, spent 1991-93 in Belize providing health education and attributes her experiences with the Peace Corps to her choice of a career in nursing. Woodcock said there isn’t a day she doesn’t think about something related to the Peace Corps and said she believes living in a different culture will not only make a person grow, but will give them a better appreciation of what they had before.
“The only way you get to understand other people is by living what they live,” she said.
The rest of the gala, which was part of a week of events organized by the MU International Center and Impact Mizzou, its international leadership program, featured performances by international student groups on campus.
Cooperation between the Peace Corps volunteers and MU’s 1,400 international students is helping to fulfill the mission of the Peace Corps, “promoting international understanding, bringing a sense of what is going on around the world back to the American society,” said MU Chancellor Brady Deaton, who volunteered for the Peace Corps in Thailand.
The goal of promoting international education was evident in many aspects of the event, Olsen said.
“It is a way of thinking, of being, of doing and the stories that flow from that,” she said. “Every one of us is a promoter of international education.”
When this story was posted in November 2005, this was on the front page of PCOL:
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| PC establishes awards for top Volunteers Gaddi H. Vasquez has established the Kennedy Service Awards to honor the hard work and service of two current Peace Corps Volunteers, two returned Peace Corps Volunteers, and two Peace Corps staff members. The award to currently serving volunteers will be based on a demonstration of impact, sustainability, creativity, and catalytic effect. Submit your nominations by December 9. |
| Why blurring the lines puts PCVs in danger When the National Call to Service legislation was amended to include Peace Corps in December of 2002, this country had not yet invaded Iraq and was not in prolonged military engagement in the Middle East, as it is now. Read the story of how one volunteer spent three years in captivity from 1976 to 1980 as the hostage of a insurrection group in Colombia in Joanne Marie Roll's op-ed on why this legislation may put soldier/PCVs in the same kind of danger. Latest: Read the ongoing dialog on the subject. |
| Peace Corps at highest Census in 30 years Congratulations to the Peace Corps for the highest number of volunteers in 30 years with 7,810 volunteers serving in 71 posts across the globe. Of course, the President's proposal to double the Peace Corps to 15,000 volunteers made in his State of the Union Address in 2002 is now a long forgotten dream. With deficits in federal spending stretching far off into the future, any substantive increase in the number of volunteers will have to wait for new approaches to funding and for a new administration. Choose your candidate and start working for him or her now. |
| 'Celebration of Service' a major success The Peace Corps Fund's 'Celebration of Service' on September 29 in New York City was a major success raising approximately $100,000 for third goal activities. In the photo are Maureen Orth (Colombia); John Coyne (Ethiopia) Co-founder of the Peace Corps Fund; Caroline Kennedy; Barbara Anne Ferris (Morocco) Co-founder; Former Senator Harris Wofford, member of the Advisory Board. Read the story here. |
| PC apologizes for the "Kasama incident" The District Commissioner for the Kasama District in Zambia issued a statement banning Peace Corps activities for ‘grave’ social misconduct and unruly behavior for an incident that occurred on September 24 involving 13 PCVs. Peace Corps said that some of the information put out about the incident was "inflammatory and false." On October 12, Country Director Davy Morris met with community leaders and apologized for the incident. All PCVs involved have been reprimanded, three are returning home, and a ban in the district has since been lifted. |
| The Peace Corps Library Peace Corps Online is proud to announce that the Peace Corps Library is now available online. With over 30,000 index entries in 500 categories, this is the largest collection of Peace Corps related stories in the world. From Acting to Zucchini, you can find hundreds of stories about what RPCVs with your same interests or from your Country of Service are doing today. If you have a web site, support the "Peace Corps Library" and link to it today. |
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Story Source: Columbia Missourian
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Tunisia; Staff; Deputy Directors - Olsen
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