Peace Corps Partnership

So, in addition to the regular projects that volunteers work on with any host agencies or counterparts in their communities, Peace Corps has set up a number of ways that volunteers can recieve funding for additional projects that they think are of importance to their community. One of these ways is a program called the Peace Corps Partnership Program.

With the Partnership Program, volunteers have the opportunity to develop a proposal and post it online. Once online, donors from the states have the ability to directly contribute to Peace Corps-implemented projects around the world.

Recently, I went through the process of developing a proposal, along with the help of employees at the Departments of Health and Education in Madriz (Somoto, where we live, is the capital of the department of Madriz). Speaking with the indivdiuals from both agencies, we decided that, given the significantly high rate of adolescent pregnancy in Madriz (30% of births are to mothers under 19 years of age) and the rising risk of HIV/AIDS, that information regarding thest topics could be an important addition to the existing curriculum in the secondary schools. So, we developed a modest proposal and plan to use the money to make materials and resources for secondary teachers to talk about these and other health topics in the context of their math, spanish, civics and biology courses.

If anyone is interested in reading about my specific project, or in donating, the link is:

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=524-069

To learn more about the Partnership Program in general, and/or to look for other projects, you can read up on opportunities at:

http://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors&&