Holly LeMasurier said she has always known she was going to join the Peace Corps. She didn’t know she would become a part of an African family or that she would meet the man she would later marry. She also didn’t know her experiences in the Peace Corps would always affect the way she views world issues.
LeMasurier was in the Peace Corps from 1997-99 and served in Namibia, in southern Africa. She was there working to train teachers in the bush who hadn’t had the opportunity for formal training and certification. While living in Namibia, she lived with a matriarchal family consisting of a woman, her five children and
a servant.
“I got to be big sister to the kids and daughter to the mom,” LeMasurier said. “It was great, us three women and our five children.”
LeMasurier is one of the 170,000 Peace Corps members to date that have served in more than 130 countries around the world. The University is currently ranked at No. 7 among large universities — those with more than 15,000 undergraduates — for producing Peace Corps volunteers. Currently, there are
81 University alumni in the Peace Corps. Since Peace Corps began in 1960, 825 University alumni have joined, ranking the University as the 31st-highest producer of Peace Corps volunteers of all ime.
There are several contributing factors to why so many University graduates choose to join the
Peace Corps.
“Students here are in a climate of conscious activism,” LeMasurier said. “They are very involved with their community and have often had a taste of outreach. They are natural candidates for the Peace Corps.”
“There is a campus commitment to service, and it is a focus of University students to have diversity and culture,” said Sara Schrock, the University’s Peace Corps representative. “And Eugene’s climate is very open to multicultural influences.”
The Peace Corps is a popular choice for recent college graduates. It offers a chance to travel, to become a part of a community in a different part of the world, and to help those in need.
Peace Corps volunteers serve for
27 months three months of intensive cultural and linguistic training and
24 months working. Often a large part of the appeal of the Peace Corps is the complete and lengthy immersion into a different culture.
“I had always wanted to live in a different country,” Schrock said. “I wanted to understand what poverty meant and to throw myself out of my comfort zone.”
Schrock served in Kenya from 2000-02 as an agricultural and forestry volunteer.
Volunteers don’t get to select the country they serve in, but they are placed according to their skills and the needs of different communities.
Possible job opportunities include education and youth
development, agriculture, environment, business development, information technology and health and HIV/AIDS education.
Volunteers are paid for their work at a living allowance that allows them to live at the same level as the people in the community they are serving in.
“The stipend is roughly equal to the basic standard of living in that country,” Schrock said.
They also receive a total of 48 vacation days. Volunteers receive $6,000 to help them transition back into life in the United States.
Volunteers must be at least 18 years old, although the average age of volunteers is 29, and 97 percent of current volunteers have at least an undergraduate degree. Without a degree, volunteers must have significant work experience in a specific area.
Serving in the Peace Corps is often a good transition for students who are between undergraduate and graduate schools, or between school and a career. Schrock said the Peace Corps is also a good stepping stone for those interested in
international studies.
Students interested in joining the Peace Corps after graduation should begin the application process the end of their junior year or the beginning of their senior year because the process takes six to 12 months from the time the application is submitted until the time when training begins.
Schrock will hold an informational meeting open to all students on
Thursday at 6 p.m. in the EMU
International Lounge.

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