Peace Corps Week: SIT alumni, faculty, and staff share how Peace Corps and SIT shaped them as global citizens
February 26th, 2025 | Alumni, Careers, Faculty, Peace Corps, SIT
By Joanna Tanger
School for International Training and the Peace Corps have a deep partnership that dates back to their original beginnings. In 1961, Peace Corps Founding Director Sargent Shriver, an alum of The Experiment in International Living, called on The Experiment team to design programs and train some of the earliest volunteers. Over time, the team helped design nearly 70 Peace Corps projects and train volunteers for service in more than 30 other countries. This formative work paved the way for the establishment of SIT in 1964.
Today, both organizations continue to be committed to presenting unique and transformative educational and cultural opportunities to students and volunteers around the world. And both organizations proudly recognize that these same individuals return from their experiences and communities abroad with a larger understanding of, and commitment to, the world.
In honor of Peace Corps Week (February 23-March 1), we asked SIT alumni, faculty, and staff who are returned Peace Corps volunteers how both the Peace Corps and SIT have inspired them to be global citizens. Here’s what they had to say.
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon from 2000-2002. During my semester in Zimbabwe with SIT Study Abroad, I learned about sustainable and community-led initiatives that change lives for the better. I wanted to be a part of that kind of international development and realized that English creates access to opportunities, so a few years after college I was teaching English in Central Africa with the Peace Corps. SIT Study Abroad showed me how to live and work—in the U.S. and abroad—with humility and respect; how to observe without judgement, and that it is possible to trust strangers who look, talk, and act differently from you.
Between SIT Study Abroad and the Peace Corps, I started to see myself as a global citizen and wanted to forge connections across borders. After serving in the Peace Corps, I returned to SIT for my master’s in international education so I could help send other young people on exchange programs. I then taught English to at-risk immigrant students in New York City Public Schools for 15 years. In my free time, I led international visitors around NYC as a Big Apple Greeter and then as a licensed tour guide. The conversations I’ve enjoyed with students, parents, and tourists proved to me that the world is a lot smaller than we tend to think and that we have much in common. Thank you SIT and Peace Corps, for giving me the tools and the experiences to do so.
Akilah Clarke
SIT Study Abroad in Zimbabwe alum
MA in International Education alum
SIT Study Abroad advisor/ Study Abroad coordinator, 2004-2006
SIT university relations manager, 2006-2008
Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Mozambique from 2005-2008. I extended a year and worked as a community health worker, focusing on using theater to teach English and public health. My sister had a friend who served in Peace Corps Guatemala and Peace Corps Paraguay, and she shared her stories. I knew I had to do Peace Corps sometime in my life. The thought of learning a new language, while living somewhere else and working to serve other people, was a trifecta of inspiration that stayed with me.
I received my MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management degree at SIT. After I graduated in 2013, I worked for SIT Study Abroad for almost 10 years, doing enrollment management for the Africa and the Middle East portfolio of undergraduate programs. I feel like the connections I made at SIT have served me wonderfully over the years. Peace Corps gave me the experiences that helped me hone my abilities to bridge cultures, and SIT gave me the understanding and vocabulary on how to name those actions and experiences.
Ian Hefele
MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management
Former SIT Study Abroad staff
Peace Corps volunteer in Mozambique
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Panama from 1995-1997. In high school, I dreamed about becoming a Peace Corps volunteer. I viewed it as an opportunity to be of service and a chance to learn about different places and cultures.
Working at SIT has given me the privilege and joy of working with students from different backgrounds and perspectives. Students’ distinct opinions and experiences bring depth and insight into the concept of global citizenship and each of our positions in the world. In our discussions, I encourage students to excavate their assumptions regarding their role in their immediate context and in the larger world. I seek to instill in students the grounding of global citizenship in each individual’s specific context. We receive students who, in some cases, are just getting their feet wet in questioning these concepts and others who have thought deeply about their positions in the world. As an academic director, each student I interact with brings a different viewpoint and learning experience. The rich discussions that SIT students create and cultivate challenge me as a scholar and as an aspiring global citizen.
Aly Dagang, PhD
SIT academic director, Panama
Peace Corps volunteer in Panama
I served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Armenia from 2018-2020. After traveling extensively throughout my undergraduate studies, I knew that I wanted to live and work abroad for an extended period. The Peace Corps gave me that opportunity and made me think of graduate studies, thanks to their extensive graduate school benefits.
SIT's MA in International Education program introduced me to theoretical concepts that influence the international education field we know today and helped me understand the different perspectives, roles, and stakeholders that have a hand in creating these types of experiential programs. The part-time model also provided the opportunity for me to apply this information in my current role as an academic and study abroad advisor at the College of Charleston.
Matthew Zittritsch
MA in International Education alum
Peace Corps volunteer in Armenia
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Namibia from 2003-2005. I was an education volunteer and worked at a primary school in a rural community in Kunene region of northwestern Namibia. I was drawn to the Peace Corps because I wanted to experience life in another country and learn about other cultures. I wanted to do work that might have a positive impact. Little did I know that the biggest positive impact would be on me.
I learned about SIT through the Peace Corps. After finishing my Peace Corps service, I earned my master’s at SIT. In some ways, I wish I had studied with SIT before joining the Peace Corps. The education I received at SIT would have made me a better volunteer. I would have been better prepared to serve in a professional capacity, and I would have had the tools and the language to better understand and analyze my own positionality and the complexities that come with something like Peace Corps service. I am incredibly grateful for both experiences, which led me to the field of international education and to my current position with SIT.
Courtney Bauman
MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership and Management
SIT university relations manager
Peace Corps volunteer in Namibia
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in the Dominican Republic from 2010-2012. While there, I served as an economic development volunteer. I worked on the development of an ecotourism business with a local guides association, taught business plan workshops, and mentored one of my students to open her own small business after winning start-up funding in a national business plan competition. I studied abroad with SIT in Ecuador in 2007, and that experience inspired me to return abroad after I graduated. I always enjoyed learning about new places and helping people, so the Peace Corps seemed like a good fit.
I think being a global citizen means holding deep respect for local knowledge and expertise. I feel grateful to be able to support our academic directors and their teams as they deliver truly life-changing experiences for our students. I’m hopeful that our students will in turn contribute to a more peaceful and just world after they return. It means a lot to me that both SIT and Peace Corps are a formative part of my story.
Daniel Malin
SIT Study Abroad in Ecuador alum
SIT program administrator for Latin America
Peace Corps volunteer in the Dominican Republic
I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Zambia from 2006-2009. I lived in the rural village of Kanyembo and worked with people in my clinic's large catchment area of about 17,000 people in Nchelenge District, Luapula Province. As a high school student, I worked for our local AIDS services organization as a peer outreach worker and led sessions on reproductive health and HIV prevention for tween girls in my hometown of Brattleboro, Vermont. As I finished my anthropology degree at Smith College, I knew I wanted to live and work abroad, continuing to do HIV prevention work and felt extremely lucky to be offered a position as an HIV prevention volunteer working under the Zambian Ministry of Health.
After serving for two years in my rural village in Luapula, I extended my service in Lusaka, as a counter-trafficking assistant at the International Organization for Migration. I gained tremendous experience in direct service, primarily with women and young women. It was a natural progression to match theory with practice and train for a career under the broad scope of SIT’s MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management. I focused on social justice and policy advocacy while honing some hard skills in fundraising and training design. I am grateful for the global education that SIT afforded me. I now serve as Groundworks' executive director in Brattleboro. SIT has certainly shaped my career path to lead by thinking globally and acting locally.
Libby Bennett
MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management
Peace Corps volunteer in Zambia
To learn more about SIT's graduate programs, please visit https://graduate.sit.edu/.