Archive - 2020

  July 11 marks the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Over the last quarter century, our two countries have built a partnership and friendship founded on shared interests, mutual respect, and people-to-people ties.  Our everyday interactions are highlighted by increasing trade and investment ties, strategic cooperation, and collaboration on humanitarian and legacy of war issues, including the solemn duty of accounting for our wartime missing.  In recent years, we have strengthened and expanded our Comprehensive Partnership, based on a shared vision of a stable and peaceful Indo-Pacific region, as well as respect for each other’s independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity, and political systems.  We commend Vietnam for its outstanding Chairmanship of ASEAN this year, especially in coordinating ASEAN’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and issues related to economic recovery. The ties between the American and Vietnamese peoples grow deeper every . . .

  from the Peace Corps WASHINGTON – Peace Corps Director Jody K. Olsen attended a reception at the State Department today to celebrate the signing by Viet Nam of the implementing agreement between the Peace Corps and the Ministry of Education and Training to officially establish the Peace Corps program in English education. The event, which also commemorated the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States of America and the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, included Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale, Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs David Stilwell, Viet Nam Ambassador to the United States Ha Kim Ngoc and Deputy Chief of Mission Hoang Thi Thanh Nga. Viet Nam will be the 143rd country to host Peace Corps volunteers since the agency was founded in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy. “We are . . .

  Inspired by the leaders, causes, and music of his youth, Chic Dambach set out to change the world. This is the fascinating life story of a ’60s antiwar and free speech leader who remained true to his values and helped build a more peaceful world. Along the way, he witnessed the torture of a black football teammate, he led a strike for his Peace Corps training group, his best friend and mentor was murdered, he donated a kidney to save his son’s life, faced financial ruin, helped end two major wars in Africa, and created the first Global Symposium of Peaceful Nations. Exhaust the Limits is a compelling adventure story and road map for idealists young and old. The cover is a caricature by Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Matt Wuerker. The story of their chance meeting on a river and his vital role in saving USIP is in the . . .

Register for NPCA Town Halls and Peace Corps Connect to the Future Summit We invite members of our community to participate in our Town Halls on July 9-16 and Peace Corps Connect to the Future ideas summit on July 18. To register, login to your NPCA account. (There is a “forgot your password,” option if needed.) You will receive a confirmation email with call in details once you have successfully signed up. Please note: Each session has a separate registration page. You may sign up for as many sessions as you like. All sessions are listed below. To register for each, click on the orange “attending” button with the checkmark by it. A green bar indicating you have successfully registered will now appear at the top of your screen. If you have any problems registering, please contact support@peacecorpsconnect.org.Thursday, July 9 (8 pm EDT) – Peace Corps Funding and Capitol Hill MobilizationSaturday, July 11 (2 pm EDT) – Recruiting the . . .

  The event tonight will be on ZOOM, at 8PM to 9:30 PM EDT. You may also participate by phone. To register: https://www.peacecorpsconnect.org/events/peace-corps-connect-for-the-future If you are not a NPCA member, you will be asked to join – there is no cost. When you have registered, you will be brought to a page with a red box. If you have registered, there will be a check in that box, saying “attending”.  Click on the red box with the check.  You should be rewarded with a green banner which says you have successfully registered. You should check your email.  You should have a message from NPCA with instructions on how to sign in to participate. It will have the sign in link and telephone numbers if you wish to call in, instead. I would advise contacting NPCA directly if you follow these instructions, which I doublechecked today, and are having any problems. . . .

   Dear friends, We are thrilled to announce our discovery of a memoir by Sargent Shriver, We Called It a War, which will be published in January 2021 by RosettaBooks. In the memoir, Sargent Shriver traces his journey in bringing the programs of the War on Poverty to life. We rediscovered the memoir in one of our archival collections some time ago, and are grateful to be able to share it with you in the coming year. For more details about the memoir, we invite you to read the official announcement below. For ease of sharing, the announcement is also on our website. Friends, we thank you for your continued interest in our work. Let’s continue to engage with each other so that we may create a more just, more peaceful society for all of us. — Sargent Shriver Peace Institute Announcement We Called it a War: Sargent Shriver’s Recently Discovered, Lost Memoir . . .

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Dan Campbell (El Salvador 1974-77) • NEW YORK (AP) — The late Sargent Shriver, the Peace Corps’ founding director and an architect of President Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty,” left behind at least one unfinished project. RosettaBooks announced Tuesday that it had acquired Shriver’s memoir We Called It a War, which he worked on in the late 1960s and was only recently rediscovered. Shriver’s friend and law partner David Birenbaum edited the manuscript, in which Shriver tells of his efforts to fulfill Johnson’s vow in 1964 to end poverty. The 348-page book, pared down from a “very raw” 500 pages, is scheduled for January. “What I learned from working with Sarge, and what I hope readers will discover in reading the book, is his distinctive model of leadership in which policy is shaped by our noblest human values and energy flows from spiritual awareness,” . . .

  Intellasia.net 7 July 2020 / South China Morning Post As conflicts over trade, technology and civil liberties dominate US-China relations, a long-standing cultural and educational bridge between the two countries has been quietly dismantled with the US Peace Corps ending its operations in China. Each summer since 1993, Peace Corps volunteers have flown into the Chinese city of Chengdu ready to fill English-language teaching positions across the country’s west, as part of an initiative to promote understanding between citizens of the two countries. This year that won’t be happening. The programme will be phased out because of “many significant changes in China over the past 26 years”, according to a statement released in February by the independent government agency’s Washington headquarters. Get the latest insights and analysis from our Global Impact newsletter on the big stories originating in China. The Covid-19 pandemic uprooted Peace Corps operations globally, with volunteers . . .

  American Dreamer: Memoirs of a Peace Corps Volunteer in Central America and Beyond By David Taylor Ives (Costa Rica 1980-82) Epigraph Publishing March 2020 292 pages $ 35.00 (hardback); $22.00 (paperback) Reviewed by Jim Skelton (Ethiopia 1970-72) • The Foreword, written by Leymah Gbowee, and the Introduction, written by Muhammad Yunus, both of whom are Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, introduce David Ives as a humble, well respected and positive man who believes there is good in humanity. Both attribute to David several other admirable qualities, such as an unshakable sense of justice, tirelessly working to build world peace, and a philosophy of reverence for life. After reading that introductory material, it became clear to me that I was about to read an amazing story featuring a remarkable man who had been recognized as being quite extraordinary by two very exceptional individuals. Moreover, I discovered that David is not only an . . .

COLUMBIA, South Carolina —  Twenty-two students from across the four states of Micronesia were awarded tuition scholarships this week, making it possible for them to attend faith-based independent elementary and high schools in Yap, Chuuk, and Pohnpei. Habele tuition scholarships are funded entirely by the individual donations of American citizens who share a love of Micronesia and the belief that high-quality education can unlock the incredible personal potential of some of the world’s most remote students. Sheridan Giltamag of Yap is one of the Habele tuition scholarship recipients for 2020-21. Awarded the Leona Peterson Memorial Scholarship, she will be a freshman at Our Lady of Mercy Catholic High School in Pohnpei in the fall. Each tuition grant is set at a level that maintains family ownership in student achievement while lightening the financial burden. Often scholarships cover between fifty and seventy-five percent of school tuition and fees. Students must maintain . . .

CORRECTION:  The original post did not have the correct information to register.  I apologize for the confusion. Here is the link to register: To register: https://www.peacecorpsconnect.org/cpages/home  All the conversations and the Town Hall will be on ZOOM. The NPCA is inviting all RPCVs to participate in the events leading up to the Town Hall as well as the actual Town Hall. The following is the text of the NPCA announcement. • We’re convening an ideas summit July 18 to ask some crucial questions about the Peace Corps community in a changed world. And as we lead up to that event, from July 8–16 we’re bringing together members of the Peace Corps community for a series of town hall discussions around issues of systemic racism, climate change, and more — to help shape our agenda for the future and ask: What are the big ideas for the Peace Corps going forward? Volunteers worldwide were evacuated because of . . .

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Dale Gilles (Liberia 1964-67)   Without providing any proof, Peter Navarro (Thailand 1972-75) accused China of purposely weaponizing the virus to kill Americans and blasted Dr. Fauci while boasting about himself By PETER WADE  Rollingstone White House trade adviser Peter Navarro (Thailand 1972-75). In an obvious attempt to deflect blame from President Trump’s dismal handling of the coronavirus pandemic in America, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro went on an extended rant on Friday, tossing out unproven conspiracy theories as if he were holding court in a QAnon forum. Navarro, a now-infamous, bomb-throwing advocate of Trump’s more than suggested that China was somehow able to “weaponize” the virus to kill Americans, while at the same time allowing many other countries to contain the spread. China “spawned the virus,” Navarro said. “They hid the virus. They sent hundreds of thousands of Chinese nationals over here to seed and spread the . . .

  Reginald Brown (Micronesia 1990-02) helps Audra Elam (Togo 2019-20) save dog from being sent back overseas after COVID-19-forced separation By Sydney Czyzon Chicago Tribune, July  02, 2020 • A Peace Corps volunteer feared her beloved dog would be sent back overseas Friday because of issues with his paperwork. Then, a former Peace Corps worker used his legal expertise to help stop the separation. Audra Elam, the 27-year-old dog owner, originally from western Illinois, was teaching children in Togo in western Africa when she had to leave in mid-March because of the spread of coronavirus. “He would follow her to school,” Andrew Orland, another Peace Corps member, said of the dog. “When she did English classes in the afternoon, he would come hang out with the kids.” Elam left behind the terrier mix, Socrates, with the hope she could return to the village and extend her stay. But when it became clear . . .