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Volunteering for Peace Corps: My Motivation Statement
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What The Motivation Statement Is
The Motivation Statement is one of the first steps in a lengthy application process. It is a short ~500-word essay that addresses two questions:
1) Why do you want to volunteer for the Peace Corps?
2) What challenges do you expect and how do you plan to deal them?
The Peace Corps wants everyone to be successful and since communication is hard, they offer plenty of tips to write a clear, concise, cogent and cohesive essay. 4 tips to make the most of your Peace Corps motivation statement. The Peace Corps is not simply looking for volunteers. They are looking for people who want to volunteer for the right reason(s). That makes sense, because if you’re running away from a bad situation, merely a thrill seeker, or just a starry-eyed kid who doesn’t know what you’re getting into, then you have a high probability of failure. And I can’t emphasize enough that the Peace Corps wants everyone to succeed.
The Volunteer Experience
Obviously, I don’t have any first-hand volunteer experience since I haven’t yet served. Everything I know is secondhand, learned by talking to veteran volunteers both in person and during Peace Corps sponsored webinars. During the COVID lockdown, all their events were virtual. Now the Peace Corps is holding local live events as well, mostly on college campuses.
As a Peace Corps volunteer, I will be expected to fulfill their mission which is: To promote world peace and friendship by fulfilling three goals:
1) To help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
2) To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
3) To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.
How those goals are accomplished looks very different from country to country. The needs of Southeast Asia are different than the needs of Africa. In fact, the needs of any individual community with a country will differ from other communities…
