Stillwater Mayor Bud Lacy declares "Peace Corps Week"



Stillwater Mayor Bud Lacy declares "Peace Corps Week"

Lacy honors Peace Corps

Caption: Carissa Champlin, Peace Corps recruiter for OSU, presents Mayor Lacy with a Peace Corps Calendar. Photo: Nathan Potter/O’Collegian

Nagila Perumal
Senior Staff Writer

Mayor Bud Lacy issued a proclamation Monday night recognizing Feb. 28 through March 6 as Peace Corps Week.

Lacy gave the proclamation in honor of the 44th anniversary of Peace Corps and its Stillwater volunteers who have traveled to several countries to help countless individuals.

“It was a great privilege to have Mayor Lacy pronounce the week and officially recognize the contributions of the volunteers from the city of Stillwater,” said Carissa Champlin, international studies graduate student and Peace Corps recruiter for Oklahoma State University.

Champlin, who has been recruiting since August 2003, said OSU is the number one Peace Corps volunteer-producing institution.

Billie Chambers, a Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador from 1962 to 1964; Mike Kizer, a volunteer in Malaysia from 1971 to 1973; Brenda Dean, a volunteer in Thailand from 1995 to 1997; and Champlin were present to receive the proclamation.

Dean said she wanted to join the Peace Corps since she was in high school.

“I arrived in Thailand on my 30th birthday,” Dean said.

Dean served as an English teacher in a secondary school in Thailand and was involved in a community development project with school children and farmers.

Chambers coordinates activities for former Peace Corps volunteers in Oklahoma. Chambers also serves as the group leader and arranges volunteer activities all over the state.

“I coordinate various volunteer activities on a regular basis and also support Carissa with Peace Corps recruiting in Stillwater,” Chambers said.

Chambers said there will be a celebration on March 6 at the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. as part of Peace Corps Week.

“We will have a panel of former Peace Corps volunteers who have served over the last few decades,” Chambers said.

In Stillwater, there will be an information table set up outside the Student Union Bookstore in the afternoons beginning Monday and running through March 6.

“It will be a great opportunity for students to get more information by talking to former volunteers, and I will also conduct class talks across campus,” Champlin said.

To join Peace Corps, one must be at least 18 years old and be a U. S. citizen. Currently, the number of volunteers is at its highest since 1974.

“We have about 7,750 volunteers serving nationwide on a 27-month project,” Champlin said.

Champlin encouraged everyone to attend the celebration on March 6 in Tulsa.

“Peace Corps is a wonderful opportunity for people of all ages, where you can learn diverse cultures from different countries,” Dean said.

For additional information, Champlin may be reached by phone, (405)744-3048, or by e-mail, pcorps@okstate.edu. The Peace Corps office is at 204 Wes Watkins Center.

When this story was posted in February 2005, this was on the front page of PCOL:

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 over 500 categories, this is the largest collection of Peace Corps related reference material in the world. From Acting to Zucchini, you can use the Main Index to find hundreds of stories about RPCVs who have your same interests, who served in your Country of Service, or who serve in your state.

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Make a call for the Peace Corps PCOL is a strong supporter of the NPCA's National Day of Action and encourages every RPCV to spend ten minutes on Tuesday, March 1 making a call to your Representatives and ask them to support President Bush's budget proposal of $345 Million to expand the Peace Corps. Take our Poll: Click here to take our poll. We'll send out a reminder and have more details early next week.

Peace Corps Calendar:Tempest in a Teapot? Bulgarian writer Ognyan Georgiev has written a story which has made the front page of the newspaper "Telegraf" criticizing the photo selection for his country in the 2005 "Peace Corps Calendar" published by RPCVs of Madison, Wisconsin. RPCV Betsy Sergeant Snow, who submitted the photograph for the calendar, has published her reply. Read the stories and leave your comments.

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February 19, 2005: This Week's Top Stories NPCA Board positions are open for nomination 17 Feb Mike Tidwell on trial for climate action protest 17 Feb Katie Dyer is co-owner of Cadeaux du Monde 16 Feb Cyclone misses Tonga and Samoa PCVs 16 Feb Phil Hardberger in debate for Mayor of San Antonio 16 Feb Edmund Hull is Princeton Diplomat-In-Residence 16 Feb Bruce Greenlee is longtime friend of Latino community 15 Feb Mike Honda new vice chairman at DNC 15 Feb Jospeh Opala documents slave crossing from Sierra Leone 14 Feb Dear Dr. Brothers: Aren't PCVs Hippies? 14 Feb Joseph Lanning founded the World Education Fund 14 Feb Stanley Levine draws Marine and Peace Corps similarities 14 Feb Speaking Out: JFK envisioned millions of RPCVs 13 Feb Chris Aquino visits mother's homeland of Vietnam 12 Feb Is PCOL blocking users from posting messages? 12 Feb JFK Library opens Sargent Shriver Collection 1 Feb RPCV responds to Bulgaria Calendar concerns 28 Jan

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WWII participants became RPCVs Read about two RPCVs who participated in World War II in very different ways long before there was a Peace Corps. Retired Rear Adm. Francis J. Thomas (RPCV Fiji), a decorated hero of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, died Friday, Jan. 21, 2005 at 100. Mary Smeltzer (RPCV Botswana), 89, followed her Japanese students into WWII internment camps. We honor both RPCVs for their service.

Bush's FY06 Budget for the Peace Corps The White House is proposing $345 Million for the Peace Corps for FY06 - a $27.7 Million (8.7%) increase that would allow at least two new posts and maintain the existing number of volunteers at approximately 7,700. Bush's 2002 proposal to double the Peace Corps to 14,000 volunteers appears to have been forgotten. The proposed budget still needs to be approved by Congress.

RPCVs mobilize support for Countries of Service RPCV Groups mobilize to support their Countries of Service. Over 200 RPCVS have already applied to the Crisis Corps to provide Tsunami Recovery aid, RPCVs have written a letter urging President Bush and Congress to aid Democracy in Ukraine, and RPCVs are writing NBC about a recent episode of the "West Wing" and asking them to get their facts right about Turkey.

RPCVs contend for Academy Awards Bolivia RPCV Taylor Hackford's film "Ray" is up for awards in six categories including best picture, best actor and best director. "Autism Is a World" co-produced by Sierra Leone RPCV Douglas Biklen and nominated for best Documentary Short Subject, seeks to increase awareness of developmental disabilities. Colombian film "El Rey," previously in the running for the foreign-language award, includes the urban legend that PCVs teamed up with El Rey to bring cocaine to U.S. soil.

Ask Not As our country prepares for the inauguration of a President, we remember one of the greatest speeches of the 20th century and how his words inspired us. "And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man."

Read the stories and leave your comments.