This month marks 63 years since President John F. Kennedy established the United States Peace Corps. Three members of the University of Georgia School of Law community share about their service as Peace Corps volunteers and how their international experiences through the agency impact the work they do for the law school today.

Since President John F. Kennedy established the Peace Corps on March 1, 1961 to promote world peace and friendship, more than 240,000 Americans have served the United States and countries around the globe as volunteers– including three who currently work at the University of Georgia School of Law. Below, Sarah Ehlers, Georgia McPeak, and Sarah Quinn reflect on their work in the Peace Corps and the connections between their time abroad and the work that they do for Georgia Law.

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Sarah Elhers, a clinic paralegal and Spanish interpreter for the Wilson Family Justice Clinic, the Community Health Law Partnership (HeLP) Clinic and the Business Law Clinic, served in Honduras from 1993-1995 as a health education volunteer. She worked with midwives and village health workers in an effort to reduce infant mortality. As a volunteer, Sarah received intensive language and cultural training that enabled her to work effectively in her host community. The Spanish language abilities that she honed in the Peace Corps continue to serve her in her work with Georgia Law.

My Peace Corps service led me to my current job as a bilingual paralegal/Spanish interpreter for the law school clinics not only because of my language skills but also due to my continued interest in serving as a bridge between communities. I feel very lucky that over 30 years later, my experience is still relevant!

Georgia McPeak, grants coordinator, served in Mali, West Africa (specifically, village of Sogolonbougou in the Koulikoro Region) from 1987-1990 as an Appropriate Technology Extension Agent. Generally, she helped local communities protect, conserve, and manage their natural resources.  More specifically, she taught people how to build, operate, maintain, and repair fuel efficient cook stoves and bread ovens, water treadle pumps, and solar food dryers.

Everything I have done since I completed my Peace Corps service has been a direct result of having been a volunteer. Being in the Peace Corps helped me get accepted to graduate school, and getting my master’s degree helped launch my career in humanitarian relief. Working in humanitarian relief settings took me back to Africa and other places including Eastern Europe, Central America, and the Caribbean. A large part of my work overseas involved developing, writing, securing, and managing grants to assist refugees and internally displaced people. The experience I had managing grants is what eventually led to my position here at the law school as the Grants Coordinator. For me, Peace Corps was an incredibly formative and positive life-changing experience.

Sarah Quinn, director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, served in Tameslouht, Morocco from 2011-2014 as a Youth Development volunteer. She was assigned a local dar chabab, or youth center, through the agency’s partnership with the Moroccan Ministry of Youth and Sports. There, she taught English to high school students and local association members, including a group of artisans. Sarah worked on several secondary projects throughout her service, including with Tameslouht’s first group of women artisans, and volunteering through a local non-profit focused on gender equity and girls’ empowerment.

My experience living and working abroad completely changed my worldview. Through the Peace Corps, I was able to learn the language, culture, and history of Morocco through the process of integrating into a rural community of about 6,000 people. While working with artisans and with a non-profit focused on girls empowerment, I saw firsthand how American foreign policy has the potential to positively impact communities and individuals on the ground in other countries– or completely miss the mark. The experience removed my ability to see things in a black and white binary, and I am now much more attuned to the shades of grey imparted by factors like cultural context and history. I also learned a new language, applied for (and received) my first grants, and made lifelong friends who continue to challenge and shape my understanding of current events around the world. My biggest takeaway from my Peace Corps experience is that more Americans need the opportunity to have transformative international experiences. It is because of this belief that I began working in the field of international education, and it is why I am so passionate about my current work encouraging law students to globalize their legal education.

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For more information about Peace Corps Week 2024, visit the agency’s website.