To translate the Peace Corps idea into reality, President Kennedy chose a successful businessman who had been, up to that time
head of the Chicago Board of Education, and incidentally, a very long-time friend of mine in Chicago, Sargent Shriver.
Sargent, how are you?
I'm fine, Dave. How are you?
Good to see you, I'm fine too. Don't see how you're so fine and healthy looking with the job you've done.
That must have been a great drain, I should think. I remember back in the early days of the Corps,
people didn't believe in it, did they?
Well, I think you're right. In the early days, a lot of people thought it was a joke. Many of the experts
laughed at the idea that Americans would volunteer to serve abroad for practically no money and under
difficult living conditions. At that point in the Peace Corps history, we had two jobs, I thought.
First to find out whether America could still produce top-minded, dedicated people, and second,
to find out if foreign countries really wanted the help of Americans of that type.
Sarge, how did you find the answers to these questions and what were they?
Well, we found the answer to the first question by calling for volunteers, and we were overwhelmed with plenty of Americans
with brains and character who wanted to serve their country abroad. On the second question, we went on a
trip around the world to find out whether foreign countries really wanted Americans of this type.
We found out that they definitely do. These facts are no longer a matter of opinion.
We've been invited to send the Peace Corps to more than 50 countries.
Every country where the Peace Corps is already at work has asked us to send more Peace Corps volunteers.
For example, in the Philippines, I learned that the government there is trying to improve education in the rural schools.
They've got to learn English and mathematics and general science if that country is going to continue to grow and prosper.
One Philippine leader explained it to me in these words. He said, "We've got the mind and the heart to do these things.
Our people are ready to move. But we need your skills to help us start."
Here in Ghana, the story was the same. "We can build the classrooms," I was told. But we can't supply the teachers.
In the Peace Corps' first year in Ghana, our volunteers taught or came into direct contact with
43-percent of all the pupils enrolled in Ghana's secondary schools. Ghana has since asked us for three
times as many volunteers. Teachers, of course, are only a part of the need.
Here in Brazil, as in other South American countries, they wanted Peace Corps volunteers to work on farms,
to help develop better methods of agriculture and rural homemaking.
Our volunteers have received a warm and generous reception everywhere in South America.
Country after country requested trained Americans to provide middle-level manpower. Engineers, teachers,
builders, mechanics, nurses, social workers, home economists, farmers, surveyors and so on.
It became apparent that they want more than manpower. [Name], a famous associate of Mahatma Ghandi,
expressed it this way, Dave. She said "Do you think that young Americans posess the spiritual values they
must have to bring the spirit of your country to our country? There is a great valueless-ness spreading
in the world, " she said. "Your volunteers must bring us more than science or technology. They must
touch the idealism of America, and bring that to us."
Finding the people who combine the right skill with the right spirit is an incredibly difficult
and delicate task. And the man who knows most about it is Dr. Lowel Kelly. He is director of the Peace
Corps selection and chairman of the Department of Psychology at the University of Michigan and former
president of the American Psychological Association. And here is Dr. Kelly to tell us a little bit about
the selection process.
Kelly: Fortunately, our task of selection is made easier by the fact that each day we receive a large
number of applications from well-qualified and highly-motivated Americans. Our task is to see to it that
projects for which we are manning. Practically all the information on the application form is then
transfered onto an IBM computer tape for ready accessibbility. Reference forms are typically mailed to
twelve persons who have known the applicant at school, at work or in his community. Those who respond are
unusually candid, sensing the importance of helping us select the kind of American they wish to see as
representative of the United States overseas. Non-competitive Peace Corps placement tests are
administered quarterly at over 400 centers throughout the United States.
All materials for each applicant are then reviewed by a specially trained professional staff which
evaluates the applicant to determine the kind of person he is, what he can do and how well he can do it.
Those selected are invited to training for a specific project. Each person invited has a right to decline
the invitation if he or she feels they are better qualified for some other project or some other country.
About two out of three whom we invite accept our invitations to training.
Garroway: After initial selection, Peace Corps volunteers get from two to three months of intensive
training in this country before they're finally assigned overseas. They get training in the language and
the lore of the country to which they'll go, and an understanding of its culture and its customs. And a
sharpening up of their own skills. They get in the best possible physical shape for their new way of life
which is usually more rigourous and more demanding than what they've been used to.
Many Peace Corps volunteers are not college graduates. Many are. Some of the most valuable and skilled
people in the Peace Corps have never even been to college. Others have been out of college for several years.
The Peace Corps college training program makes each one richer in knowledge and better able to give to others.
Here at Rutgers University, a group of volunteers scheduled to work in agriculture and community
development in Colombia, South America are learning the language of that host country. At Ohio State
UNiversity, another group of Peace Corps volunteers gets ready for its assignment in India.
In this modern language labratory, they're getting their first taste of one of India's many languages, in this case, Punjabi.
At Texas Western College, a group of volunteers are getting classroom training and field training too for
their project in Tanganica in Africa, which is the surveying and building of farm-to-market roads in that country.
And to make geological surveys to discover untapped mineral wealth.
For many volunteers, the next stop after state-side training is the Peace Corps camp in Peurto Rico.
Here each Peace Corps volunteer is given a taste of the rigorous life he or she will lead for the next two years.
Here in Peurto Rico, volunteers are not only given physical conditioning, but also a good deal of
preparation for the emotional challenges they will face. No volunteer is asked to do more than he can,
but each is asked to find out how much he can do and then, to do it.
Not all volunteers get training this strenuous. Physical conditioning depends on the volunteer's age,
ability and the job he'll be doing. Good health and adaptability is the aim, not bulging muscles.
In Puert Rico, volunteers live for a while with Peurto Rican families in one of the remote villages. And
in this way, they get a first-hand understanding of the close, personal relationships which they will have
to develop with the people of the country in which they serve, serve for two years in the Peace Corps.
The Peace Corps is open to qualified American citizens over 18 years of age. There is no upper age limit,
and men and women in their 50s and 60s are already overseas with the Peace Corps. Volunteers who have
dependants cannot be accepted, but husbands and wives can serve together if both qualify for the same project.
The prime requisites are simple and I think perhaps [word]. Sound health, emotional stability,
maturity, a willingness to work with other people, initiative and a desire to serve. Those are the prime requisites.
The length of service is two years, which includes training time. And volunteers will
receive allowances which cover their food, clothing, housing, medical care, incidentals and a termination
payment of 1800 dollars based on 75 dollars for each month of service. Peace Corps volunteer
questionaires are available right now from your Post Office, your congressman or your senator.
If you are tired of talking about a better world, and you'd like to do something about it,
the peace Corps may very well be your answer.
Peace.