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In celebration of Peace Corps week, Georgia Law student Sonya Edwards (J.D. ’28) reflects on her service in Colombia

Peace Corps Week, which takes place March 1-6 this year, commemorates President John F. Kennedy’s establishment of the agency on March 1, 1961. This week celebrates the work the organization and its volunteers do to make a difference at home and abroad. More than 240,000 Americans have served the United States and countries around the globe as Peace Corps volunteers, including current University of Georgia School of Law student Sonya Edwards (J.D. ’28). Sonya served in Simijaca, Cundinamarca, Colombia, as an Education Volunteer – TEFL from 2023-2025. In today’s guest post, Sonya reflects on her work abroad and the connections between that experience, what it’s like to be a law student, and how her time abroad relates to her career goals.

What initially inspired you to join the Peace Corps?

The Peace Corps had been vaguely on my mind since high school. I initially wanted to join to serve others, learn Spanish, and experience a new culture. During college, my study abroad program in Chile was canceled due to COVID, so I began looking for another way to live in Latin America. Right after I found out the program was canceled, I went on a nonprofit yoga retreat and met a retired woman who had just returned from Peace Corps. Hearing her stories during that one conversation really inspired me to look more into Peace Corps, and I decided to apply.

Understanding that there usually is no such thing as a “typical day” for a volunteer in the Peace Corps, share an overview about what life was like for you in Colombia and what type of work you engaged in.

I lived in a small town in Colombia, about three and a half hours by bus from the capital. The town had around 13,000 people, and I lived with a host family. I had my own bedroom and bathroom in the house. I was very fortunate to have a large bathroom and an electric heater in my shower, so I always felt very safe and comfortable. I shared the living room, kitchen, and patio with the family. I lived with a single mother, Marina, and her youngest son, Jeisson, who is my age. Marina had two other sons, both of whom had families of their own. Between the three sons, they had four daughters, and the youngest three would usually be brought over to the house in the afternoon to spend time with Marina and me or to join in on fiestas. My host brothers liked to tease me, especially on a couple of occasions when I may have overreacted to a mouse being in the house.

Shortly before I left, I became a godmother to the newest member of the family, Jeisson’s daughter, Leah Celeste. I still talk to my Colombian family and am going back to visit them and baptize Leah in May.

In the mornings, I walked or biked to the school, about one kilometer away from my house, where I taught English alongside co-teachers. I also went to the rural schools, where classrooms had anywhere from four to 30 children of different ages all together in one room (these were my favorite students!). Furthermore, I taught community classes in the afternoons at the town’s Casa de Cultura, which functions like a community center offering free classes of all sorts (examples: Zumba, painting, cooking, knitting) to both children and adults. I participated in many of these classes myself with some of my friends and found they were a great way to meet new people.

In my free time, I would go running or hiking around town because the weather was always perfect and the nature was stunning. Through this, I bonded with a neighbor’s dog who decided he loved me and would always accompany me (despite my promise to myself that I would not get attached to any animals there). Pretty much the entire town thought he was my dog, named “Squirrel,” “Squirrelito,” or “Ardilla.” Another funny story involving the dog, which is very Peace Corps-coded, is that one time a friend came to my community English class, and one of my younger students said, “I thought the dog was your only friend.”

Are there any projects or moments from your service that you’re particularly proud of?

I started a drowning prevention program after a local drowning incident involving two young children in my community. I was truly working at the local level with many different people and organizations to raise funds and gather support for the project. Three times per week, I went with teachers and rural elementary students to a neighboring town for swim lessons. As a former swimmer and lifeguard, I also helped teach the lessons. During this project, I faced many obstacles and roadblocks. It was both incredibly rewarding and very frustrating to make it happen!

I’m also proud of the small, everyday moments. I’ve done some very strange things (for example, sitting on a bus next to a rooster, a kitten, and a screaming child for overe eight hours) during my service that have prepared me for anything. At this point, I truly do not think anything could surprise me.

Describe the connection to and the journey between Peace Corps and law school. Did you always plan to go to law school? Was that decision impacted by your service in any way?

Law school had been on my mind even before joining the Peace Corps, and I had already started taking steps toward applying. My service gave me time to reflect on the decision and ultimately showed me that law school was the right path for me.

While in Colombia, I was exposed daily to local culture and community dynamics. One primary takeaway was understanding how essential critical thinking skills are. During my service, I participated in a gender equality initiative by creating a GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) club in my community.

My involvement with GLOW reinforced my desire to attend law school and learn how to think like an attorney so that I can apply these skills in the child welfare field. Being a GLOW leader made me very aware of the many issues young girls, especially those in rural areas, face. My work in GLOW also taught me effective strategies for working with teenagers, which I would like to use from a legal perspective to help influence legislation surrounding children’s education. This further reinforced my goal of working in child welfare.

Learning to think through issues and problem-solve was critical for my role in GLOW and many of the other projects I did in Colombia. I loved the challenge of resolving issues as they arose. Thus, I realized that the best way for me personally to make a positive impact in the child welfare field was by going to law school to continue developing these critical thinking skills.

How does your time in the Peace Corps relate to your long-term professional goals?

I want to work in child welfare law, and Peace Corps gave me extensive experience in this area. Being on the ground and directly interacting with communities was invaluable and allowed me to identify community and individual needs at a local level.

Now that I have begun looking at child welfare from a legal perspective through applying for summer internships and through training with a Guardian ad Litem program, I have realized how much impact my time in Peace Corps has had on my understanding of child welfare and family dynamics. I have developed greater empathy for families who have had children removed from their homes. Peace Corps reinforced for me that, while of course the safety and emotional/physical/psychological well-being of the child are paramount, each child and family is unique. Peace Corps taught me that community standards and norms for raising children can vary and that there is more than one right way to raise a child.

I also became very well-read and well-traveled during my service at very little personal financial expense. This has allowed me to engage in intellectual conversations that I otherwise might not have been able to participate in.

Practically speaking, so much happened during my time in Colombia that for every interview question I have been asked this season, I have a situational example from my Peace Corps experience. If it’s a question someone can think up, it probably happened in Peace Corps.

What is a takeaway or lesson learned from your time in the Peace Corps that you want to share with the law school community?

Always bring a book (or something to do) with you. You never know when you’ll end up waiting. It can be particularly frustrating for me when I have something that needs to be done and I’m not able to do it. Given the amount of reading we have in law school, it’s never a bad idea to be prepared with work so that if something is delayed or someone is late, I have something productive to do rather than feeling stressed and allowing resentment to build. On that note, I also learned a lot about patience and the importance of letting small things go. Almost nothing is truly that serious or worth getting upset about.

Georgia Law’s Returned Peace Corps volunteers reflect on service during 63rd anniversary of Peace Corps

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.

    First Legal Spanish Course Offered at UGA Law This Fall

    This fall, UGA Law students have the opportunity to enroll in a new Legal Spanish course taught by Professor Kristen Shepherd, Community Health Law Partnership Clinic Staff Attorney & Adjunct Instructor.

    Professor Shepherd conceptualized and proposed the course as two consecutive courses, Legal Spanish I and Legal Spanish II, both offered for one credit. Each course teaches students Spanish language skills used in legal settings with a focus on listening and speaking comprehension. They also provide students with a broad overview of the basics of the legal systems in Spanish-speaking countries to enable students to communicate legal concepts more accurately and efficiently.

    The opportunity for students to learn Spanish for use in legal careers has taken several forms over the past decade at UGA Law. It began as a club led by Pedro Dorado (J.D. ‘17, LL.M. ‘15) before moving to a lunchtime study session led by two students who had completed Global Externships, one in a Spanish-speaking country. During the pandemic, Legal Spanish once again became a club that met regularly on Zoom.

    Across changes in instructors and format, the ability to hone Spanish language skills specific to the legal profession has continued to be a goal that students felt strongly about institutionalizing. Third-year student Patricia Fors was a driving force behind turning this club into a for-credit course. Since Spring 2022, Ms. Fors has worked with Center faculty and staff to communicate the student demand for the course and to provide a student perspective on the course proposals.

    “There is a high demand for attorneys able to effectively communicate with Spanish-speaking clients,” Ms. Fors communicated to us in an email. “I’m incredibly proud to attend a law school committed to breaking down one of the barriers that Hispanic communities face accessing the legal system.”

    Professor Shepherd agreed with Ms. Fors’ sentiment, stating: “I am inspired by the student movement that led to this course—it is a reflection of our students’ dedication to providing first rate legal representation to a traditionally underserved population with diligence and sensitivity. I am confident that this will lead to better legal outcomes and client relationships.”

    The inaugural course enrolled 17 students, all of whom speak conversational Spanish. Not only will they benefit from this new course, but so will the clients and communities they work with across their careers.

    For more information about Legal Spanish, please contact Professor Shepherd.