Workplace

The work environments between AmeriCorps and Peace Corps can be extremely different depending on what type of assignment you have. I was assigned to the Community Health & Economic Development sector in Lesotho, which basically equates to absence of structure.

As for AmeriCorps, it is a real job: 40 hours per week with the same holidays and vacation accrual that all other employees have. You are an employee of the organization, you fill out time sheets. You just don’t get paid by your host organization. During your pre-service orientation, you are given the work plan that your organization submitted in applying for a Vista. This may alter somewhat when you actually start working, but for the most part there are solid outcomes that the organization wants achieved each quarter of the year. And of course, as you are in an American workplace, you are protected under federal laws such as compliance with ADA and freedom from sexual harassment and intimidation.

Not necessarily so in a Peace Corps country. Part of Peace Corps’ reasons for such rigorous medical screening is because their host communities cannot necessarily accommodate people with disabilities. Also, the US has several laws in place protecting Americans’ physical and mental safety that have been enforced for decades. Some countries may not have that or the laws may be recent developments that clash at least a bit with cultural priorities. Peace Corps Admin lend support and try to preempt where they can with policies and agreements made with the community. However, they can only do so much; that’s the bargain you’ve struck. Peace Corps is a more casual work environment where work hours and non-work hours bleed together, and that means your community may not have the same boundaries you do. This can apply to personal space, personal time and gender roles. A little grim, but the upside of this is that PCVs basically make their own hours, and they don’t necessarily always add up to eight per day. Since cultural immersion knows no schedule, work for PCVs is always a combination of cultural reconciliation and actual work. This is why the three Peace Corps goals are so important:

1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

In my opinion, the only thing a PCV can definitely succeed at while in-country is the second goal. The first goal is secondary because that depends on variables outside of PCVs’ control. You can cobble together workshops, prioritize sustainability and capacity-building, but much of the long-term success of these things depend on host country nationals’ reception to them, awareness of your own intentions and how taxed your emotional reserves are.

This is where, from an American outlook, AmeriCorps volunteers can do more to set precedents than PCVs can. Back in January 2008, former country director Robert Strauss wrote a piece from the New York Times indicting Peace Corps for sending green volunteers abroad:

The Peace Corps has long shipped out well-meaning young people possessing little more than good intentions and a college diploma. What the agency should begin doing is recruiting only the best of recent graduates — as the top professional schools do — and only those older people whose skills and personal characteristics are a solid fit for the needs of the host country.

I wholeheartedly disagree with Mr. Strauss’ opinion but will say that for those who have exercised their organizing skills in college or professional skills in that sort of setting, be prepared to feel frustrated. In my belated response posted on my Peace Corps blog, I said:

Within my several months as a Peace Corps volunteer, I realized that as Americans, we like to do things big; we equivocate titles, status, and big machinery with legitimacy and effectiveness … The focus should be on empowering and equipping host country nationals to help their communities, not setting new precedents that cannot be met once PCVs no longer travel through.

What this means for PCVs is they must meet their communities where they are. This might mean that some of your powerful brainstorming skills are not used, or your connections to “rich westerners” and grant writing skills need to be placed on the backburner. In other words, you are not there to steal the show or run away with it once your two years are gone.

With AmeriCorps, the potential for doing something really exciting and having a project of your own is much more tangible. The work values of your organization are American, and so are you. The need to turn out results, to strategize and implement are inline with your own. So take advantage and see just how much you can surprise yourself.

One thing I will say that is an advantage or disadvantage depending on how you look at it stems from AmeriCorps policy about Vista sites. From what I learned during the CTC Project’s orientation, an organization can have up to three volunteer tours and then that particular Vista position with the organization is retired. Peace Corps’ sites can go on on indefinitely.

AmeriCorps Vistas serving the first tour face the difficulty of being first. There is the opportunity to define the position, but there’s also the frustration of not knowing where to begin. You can find yourself feeling unproductive because your role is new and you may have few outcomes that anyone has to rely on immediately, so it hasn’t yet been fully integrated into the organization. The first Vista’s definition of the role becomes a model and launch pad for following Vistas.

PCVs must also create their own structure, but there is so much cultural adjustment going on that it rivals the lack of structure for mental stress. And although Peace Corps sites can have an indefinite number of volunteers following Peace Corps evaluations and community needs, each volunteer brings in his or her own focus and lens. For example, the PCV before me in Menkhoaneng focused on HIV/AIDS. I focused on agriculture and the environment. PCVs aren’t often expected to continue other PCVs’ projects (anyone who wants to pass down his/her projects should just extend their service), but PCVs should expect to encounter the following well-worn question: “Well, when PCV Alpha was here, s/he did this. Why don’t you?”