Aspiration Statement

Once a Peace Corps invitation is received and accepted more paperwork! One is a Aspiration Statement, which is one of two document that your host country sees. They don't see any of the other paperwork that you did for the application. The other document is a revised resume that is tailored for your host country.

Aspiration Statement
Country of Service: Benin
Departure: July 15, 2010

A: The professional attributes that you plan to use, and what aspirations you hope to fulfill, during your Peace Corps service.

As an older volunteer, I feel that I’m bringing not only my professional experiences with me but also my ‘life’ experiences. Professionally, I can and have work with many personalities, ranging the difficult, the easy to work with, to the needy; I have worked as a team member and routinely assigned myself tasks when I see something that needs to be done; I’m always striving to find easier, logical methods and ways to complete an assignment, but also understand that each project can at times have it own natural pace; and I continuously research new and old information and facts in the effort to more be accurate, to fully understand and expand my what I know. My ‘life’ experiences support my professional attributes by giving them a sturdy framework to base my actions on. These experiences range from parenthood, volunteerism, workshops and culture events, to working at variety of different jobs, which has allowed me to interact with many types of people and situations.

My aspirations for the Peace Corps is to fully realize the challenge that I been given. To bring my experiences to a community, to encourage small seeds of change and new based on what is needed to work with them within the framework of their culture. I am excited to be working in the Environment Program, which has become a deep and abiding interest for me over the last several years.

B: Your strategies for working effectively with the host country partners to meet expressed needs.

Listening, Patience, Persistence: By acknowledging that there will be differences in the way that my host country partners and I are used to conducting business and interacting with those who we will come in contact with. To listen to what I am saying and what I’m hearing, taking the time to make sure that we are communication clearly to each other. To have the patience to understand and work with the idea the progress will more than likely be slow or seemly none at all and to be quietly persistent day-by-day with the knowledge that each day counts.

C: Your strategies for adapting to a new culture with respect to your own cultural background.

By being flexible. To fully realize that I will be working and living in a completely different culture and to give myself time to adapt to my new environment. To continue to research about Benin before I leave in order to develop a base understanding for a different culture. I have lived in a highly diversified area and have worked, lived, interacted with many different ethnical groups. I’m comfortable with the knowledge that there will be possibly be times that I will not understand why someone actions/reactions are different than what I assumed they should be. I’m comfortable with the fact that I will appear to be different to others, but know I can still be myself while being culturally sensitive to those I will be working and living with.
D: The skills and knowledge you hope to gain during pre-service training to best serve your future community and project.

The area where I have the most concern is building up my language competency to reach the level of French proficiency required. I tackled this weakest skill area as soon as I found out that I was nominated by signing up for accredited French classes for this spring semester. I acquired a French tutor in November 2009 before the classes started and who will continue tutoring me twice a week until I leave. I love the idea that I will be staying with a Beninese family and I’m eager to start using my budding French in real life situations.

E: How you think the Peace Corps Service will influence your personal and professional aspirations after your service ends.

While I intellectually knew that there was more to life than my family, friends and a job that guaranteed a decent retirement…I also felt that there had to be more. Personally, I feel that I will come back from Africa with a wider world view that will both enrich me and my writing. Professionally, I expect to work beyond an average retirement age in new challenging career that will be possible with my Peace Corps service. Some possibilities that I been researching: A counselor or supervisor within a nonprofit organizations like the 4-H, a director for a farming association implementing new programs and educational materials for the membership, working for a state Department of Agriculture or even the Federal Agriculture Department on regulations, new technology or enforcing current regulations.