Archive - November 2021

  by Andre Silva Borgen Magazine, November 22, 2021   WESTBURY, New York — The High Atlas Foundation is helping Morocco’s local communities determine how they choose to develop their land and grow out of poverty sustainably. Like those in the northern Atlas Mountains, Morocco’s most vulnerable communities have long suffered from water scarcity, shaky access to land and unregulated grazing rights. These hardships make it difficult for many individual planters to harvest profitable yields on their produce and further strain their labors. Also, their reliance on traditional and overplanted crops like barley, corn and dates deliver low profits. Additionally, they exasperate a low diversity of fruits and vegetables in the poorest of the nation’s regions. While Morocco’s red fruit production saw an increase of 84% last year, many of the nation’s poorest farmers were not included in the agricultural boom. Yet, one organization is working to reverse this in a new sustainable development model, improving . . .

  Speech on peace delivered by President John F. Kennedy at American University on 10 June 1963     President Anderson, members of the faculty, board of trustees, distinguished guests, my old colleague, Senator Bob Byrd, who has earned his degree through many years of attending night law school, while I am earning mine in the next 30 minutes, ladies and gentlemen: It is with great pride that I participate in this ceremony of the American University, sponsored by the Methodist Church, founded by Bishop John Fletcher Hurst, and first opened by President Woodrow Wilson in 1914. This is a young and growing university, but it has already fulfilled Bishop Hurst’s enlightened hope for the study of history and public affairs in a city devoted to the making of history and to the conduct of the public’s business. By sponsoring this institution of higher learning for all who wish to learn, . . .

The first Peace Corps Conference of RPCVs was help in 1965 at the State Department. As Shriver said to the gathering at the opening session. “Who would have thought three years ago the Peace Corps  was going to take over the State Department?” They did for their first reunion called CITIZENS IN A TIME OF CHANGE> 1965 RPCV Conference Report Low-Res    

  We are currently hiring for the following headquarters positions:   Chief Operating Officer Deadline to apply is December 10, 2021 Accounting and Evaluation Manager Deadline to apply is December 10, 2021 Communications and Development Associate Deadline to apply is December 10, 2021 Training Coordinator Deadline to apply is December 10, 2021

Kwamboka’s Inquiry by Arthur Dobrin (Kenya 1965-67) Nsemia Inc. Publishers 146 pages March 2017 $8.99 (Kindle); $25.73 (Paperback)     Reviewed by Stephen Foehr (Ethiopia 1965-67) The opening scene: Funeral preparations in a churchyard for a murder victim, the respected co-founder of a Kenyan school, who was inexplicably shot to death in her home. Nothing was stolen. Inspector James Dingiria, from Nairobi, outside the district, was sent to investigate. This is the set-up of Arthur Dobrin’s novel, Kwamboka’s Inquiry, which is much about Kenyan society as a murder mystery. Dobrin has an acute eye for physical details that puts the reader on the scene, and an understanding of the underlying social, tribal, and economic tensions that inform the story. He and his wife served in the Peace Corps in Kenya, which made them first-hand witnesses. Initially, the murder was thought to be the work of the Sungu Sungu, originally formed . . .

Peace Corps has been working to establish a program in Vietnam since  2004 and today much has been done in anticipation of Peace Corps in Vietnam next year.  Read: “Annual Report July 2020 to July 2021 Building a Foundation” Peace Corps Vietnam From that report: “The Peace Corps opening in Viet Nam represents decades of work involving hundreds of people with a collective vision for promoting closer people-to-people ties between the United States and Viet Nam. In 2004, Le Van Bang Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs formally invited Peace Corps to Vietnam. Two years later, Peace Corps sent a four-person assessment team led by John L. Williams, the then Peace Corps Thailand Country Director, to Viet Nam to conduct a new country assessment. The report concluded that Viet Nam would provide a welcoming environment in which Volunteers would be successful. On May 24, 2016, during President Obama’s only official trip to . . .