A group of Georgetown students backed by the Roosevelt Institute aims to create a one-year Peace Corps fellowship for matriculating high school seniors.
The Institute — a network of student think tanks headquartered in Washington — supports more than 80 campus chapters in order to promote progressive values in public policy, according to the Institute website.
The Georgetown team members chose to develop a Peace Corps fellowship because of its potential to provide a unique experiential education to graduating high school seniors while simultaneously aiding the international community.
"Students often have their blinders on and are encouraged to undertake a liberal arts course of study without any interaction outside of these boundaries," said Marley Brown (COL '12), a member of the Georgetown chapter who contributed to the proposal. "We wanted to find a way of making international service meaningful to … the needs of the international community."
While the details of the proposal remain undefined, committee members said that an academically talented group would be accepted to partake each year. Chosen candidates would split nine months between training, shadowing Peace Corps volunteers and serving the community in a designated junior fellowship site.
Contact with the Peace Corps has been limited since the policy is still being drafted, but the reception thus far has been mostly positive.
"The Peace Corps volunteer I spoke with…said it was a great idea, but the Peace Corps spends a lot of money on training and they want to ensure they have volunteers who will make a full-time commitment," he said. "Plus, it usually takes a long time to establish oneself in a village to actually accomplish anything."
To circumvent this potential problem, the committee has devised the ‘established site' concept, whereby only certain sites would be designated for those on the junior fellowship.
In accordance with the Roosevelt Institute's guidelines, the committee also sought to propose an idea that could be successful in a relatively short period of time.
"It had to be something that people could actually manage, not some abstract thing that idealistic college kids are writing about," Brown said.
According to Jake Sneeden (SFS '12), who helped found the Georgetown chapter of the Roosevelt Institute, the Peace Corps program would provide high school students with the opportunity to reap the benefits of a gap year without incurring the costs often associated with such an endeavor.
"[The proposal] came a bit from…what I see as a need to make gap years more available to everyone regardless of monetary background and … to have them as a more mainstream aspect of the educational process," he said.
Brown added that a Peace Corps fellowship would provide students with a more meaningful gap year than many alternatives.
"Jake [Sneeden] took a gap year and was amazed at how many kids were doing things that aren't relevant to their experiences. They were just traveling aimlessly," Brown said. "There's nothing wrong with that, but they could have made their experiences more constructive."
Working on the proposal has given students a unique opportunity to experience the intricacies of policy-making and lobbying firsthand.
"So many students at Georgetown are interested in politics and policy, but the Roosevelt Institute is the only organization that translates this interest into tangible and actionable policy proposals and advocacy," said Carolina Delgado (GRD '13), co-founder of Georgetown's chapter. "Not only do Georgetown members of the Roosevelt Institute get to discuss politics, they get to make a real difference politically by publishing their ideas and advocating on their behalf to important political players."
The first proposal of Georgetown's chapter of the Roosevelt Institute has been accepted as one of the Institute's Ten Ideas for Education to be featured in its fall 2011 publication. The Georgetown chapter will now receive the help of an ouside staff of editors and advisers from the Institute to help the Hilltop team bring the fellowship to fruition.
Brown said that the Roosevelt Institute's decision to take on the Georgetown proposal is a testament to the group's focus and commitment.
"Our recent success suggests that even if you're just starting out, if you work hard and develop an idea that seems actionable, you're rewarded," he said.
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