Photo Courtesy: © Peace Corps, Tanzania, Health
The Peace Corps
The Peace Corps has been a leader in international development and citizen diplomacy for more than 50 years across more than 140 countries.
The Peace Corps sends Americans abroad to work with communities at the grassroots level towards sustainable change that lives on long after their service. They learn about leadership, ingenuity, self-reliance, and relationship building while becoming global citizens. Although the times have changed since the Peace Corps’ founding in 1961, the agency’s mission – to promote world peace and friendship – has not. The Peace Corps changes lives – the lives of the volunteers and the lives of people in communities around the world.
Our Program
The URI Peace Corps Prep Program, the first program of its kind in Rhode Island is the product of a partnership between the University of Rhode Island and the Peace Corps organization. The program prepares students for volunteer work in international development programs, potentially with the Peace Corps. Peace Corps Prep’s four central learning objectives are: training and experience in a specific work sector, foreign language skills, intercultural awareness, and professional and leadership development.
The certificate of completion does not guarantee entry into the Peace Corps, which gets about 23,000 applications a year. There are 6,900 volunteers and trainees in the program now. Those applicants who hold a Peace Corps prep certification go into a smaller pool that generally get more attention.
Hundreds of URI graduates have contributed their skills to communities around the world and the University often ranks among the top volunteer-producing schools.