BMC RANKS AMONG TOP PRODUCERS OF PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEERS

For the second year in a row, Bryn Mawr is among the top five colleges and universities in per-capita production of Peace Corps volunteers, the Peace Corps has announced. Sixteen alumnae of the undergraduate college — one for every 82 students — are serving as active volunteers, earning Bryn Mawr a per-capita ranking of fourth in the nation. Two alumnae/i of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences are serving in the Peace Corps as well.

The Peace Corps was established in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy, who challenged students to serve their country and the cause of peace by living and working in the developing world. Each volunteer spends two years in a developing country, first learning the local language and customs and then helping communities make gains in areas such as education, youth outreach and community development, business development, environment and conservation, agriculture, health and HIV/AIDS awareness, and information technology. Bryn Mawr has contributed 118 PCVs (Peace Corps volunteers) over the life of the program.

The percentage of graduates currently enrolled in the Peace Corps was among the criteria cited by the Washington Monthly last fall in its list of colleges and universities that contribute to the public good. Bryn Mawr earned high marks in that survey.

Debra Rubin, director of Bryn Mawr's Civic Engagement Office, sees Peace Corps service as consonant with the College's culture of activism and engagement. "Our students are very committed to service," she says. "They express that in a variety of ways, and most say they hope to continue to do service after they graduate."

Rubin and her staff foster that commitment. Shani Arbel '04, who is currently serving in Belize, says that her participation in community service increased significantly while she was at Bryn Mawr. "It was just so easy to volunteer through the College," she explains. "There was always an opportunity to do something if you were interested." Through the College's program, Arbel found volunteer positions at the Academy of Natural Sciences and in two tutoring programs. She found a position as a volunteer EMT with the Radnor Fire Company on her own.

A biology major with a concentration in environmental education, Arbel is in the Peace Corps' environmental-education program in Seine Bight, a small village in southern Belize on the Placencia Peninsula. She works at a school that was overwhelmed with new students last fall when nearby tourism development brought an influx of new workers to the area.

"Everything I learned at Bryn Mawr is helping me now in some way," Arbel says. "Bryn Mawr taught me to be open to different viewpoints and life experiences, which is critical in the Peace Corps. But self-motivation is probably the most useful thing I learned." The Peace Corps expects volunteers to be largely self-directed; most plan and develop their own projects.

Arbel says she isn't surprised that Bryn Mawr produces so many PCVs. "Everyone there is so motivated and open and idealistic, and many are interested in travel — those are all qualities that I associate with Peace Corps volunteers," she says.

Lauren Hildebrand '03 agrees.

Lauren Hildebrand '03 participates in a traditional ceremony as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ghana.

"I'm surprised there aren't more of us," says the Bryn Mawr political-science major, who returned from a Peace Corps term in Ghana last November. "Anyone who goes to Bryn Mawr is a pretty determined, individualistic person. You need those traits in the Peace Corps."

At Bryn Mawr, Hildebrand founded One World, an internationally focused activist group that, among other things, successfully lobbied Bryn Mawr Dining Services to serve only fair-trade-certified coffee in the dining halls. She wrote her senior thesis on international development and welcomed a chance to see it in action in the Peace Corps.

As a PCV, Hildebrand says, "I learned a lot about development and about how government does and doesn't work. I was able to see much more clearly the problems associated with foreign aid — how much of it is siphoned off by corruption."

Hildebrand was a health- and water-sanitation volunteer, working with Ghana's National Guinea-worm Eradication Program. In a remote, isolated agricultural village in northern Ghana's West Gonja District, she did health education in schools, distributed water filters and improved conditions at rainwater reservoirs. She also helped mobilize community support for NGO workers who drilled boreholes, which "extend all the way down to the aquifer and are capped, so they're a much safer water source" than above-ground reservoirs.

"I feel really good about my Peace Corps service," she says. "I wouldn't trade those two years for anything."

Bryn Mawr graduates are currently serving as Peace Corps volunters in Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Cameroon, El Salvador, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Kenya, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Panama, Romania, Senegal and South Africa.

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