An 81-year-old retired American teacher is among the latest batch of United States Peace Corps volunteers currently undergoing training to help Filipino public school English teachers gain better language skills. Sally Porter is among the 69 US Peace Corps volunteers who arrived last Aug.16 for a three-month training now taking place in Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental. They will replace the volunteers who left last June 6 at the end of a two-year tour of duty. “I do not see it as a replacement of the young people. Our corps of the Peace Corps would always be the younger people of college and university campuses or early in the development of their careers,” Tschetter pointed out. “If we bring a little higher component of this (age) group together with this group, it will just make the Peace Corps stronger. But the impact to the country we are serving will get stronger as well. So it’s really a win-win situation,” he stressed.
Sally Porter, 81 serves as Peace Corps Volunteer in Philippines
Teacher, 81, joins US Peace Corps
By Marichu Villanueva
Friday, August 29, 2008
An 81-year-old retired American teacher is among the latest batch of United States Peace Corps volunteers currently undergoing training to help Filipino public school English teachers gain better language skills.
Sally Porter is among the 69 US Peace Corps volunteers who arrived last Aug.16 for a three-month training now taking place in Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental. They will replace the volunteers who left last June 6 at the end of a two-year tour of duty.
The latest batch of volunteer-trainees were met yesterday in Dumaguete City by US Peace Corps Director Ronald Tschetter who arrived in the Philippines on his global round of visits to countries that host the US Peace Corps.
Before proceeding to Negros, Tschetter met the press at the US Embassy in Manila yesterday, and said the retired American teacher volunteer is the result of their new program adopted in September last year to enlist the participation of retired professionals and tap their spirit of volunteerism.
Since the program was launched, Tschetter said there has been a 65 percent increase in applications last May as more Americans want to join the Peace Corps.
“I do not see it as a replacement of the young people. Our corps of the Peace Corps would always be the younger people of college and university campuses or early in the development of their careers,” Tschetter pointed out.
“If we bring a little higher component of this (age) group together with this group, it will just make the Peace Corps stronger. But the impact to the country we are serving will get stronger as well. So it’s really a win-win situation,” he stressed.
The US Peace Corps, the biggest American organization of volunteers, recruits volunteers to work in countries that request assistance for language education, sustainable skills training, health promotion and disease awareness and prevention, and environment protection, among others. The US Peace Corps assigns the volunteers to the requesting country, which in turn will find host homes for them.
Tschetter said more than 190,000 people have served as Peace Corps volunteers in 139 countries, including the Philippines, since its establishment in 1960. Tschetter and his wife Nancy were Peace Corps volunteers who worked as community health workers in India from 1966 to 1968. He is the third director in the Peace Corps’ history to have previously served as a volunteer.
