World Cup Action: South Korea v Czechia

Peace Corps Links to World Cup Play

Match Two of World Cup play tomorrow in Guadalajara will feature teams I know little about. But I do know something about both countries, although I’ve never visited either.

For one thing, both are former host countries for Peace Corps Volunteers: Korea from 1966-1981, Czechoslovakia from 1990-1997.

Bolder fact: Korea is the only Peace Corps host country to later send volunteers in a similar manner through World Friends Korea.

Profiles in Service: Peace Corps Roots in American Diplomacy covers this in the chapter featuring Ambassador Kathleen Stephens, who worked in Korea during three very different eras. She served as a Peace Corps Volunteer during the economic development taking place in the Seventies; in Foreign Service reporting roles during the political revolution throughout the Eighties; and finally as U.S. Ambassador (2008-11) after Korea had achieved prominence on the global stage.

Her story recalls JFK’s signing of Executive Order 10924 in 1961, authorizing the Peace Corps to exist within the Department of State. He declared his intent that the agency should “Help foreign countries meet their urgent needs for skilled manpower.” He also said:

Let us hope that other nations will mobilize the spirit and energies and skill of their people in some form of Peace Corps—making our own effort only one step in a major international effort to increase the welfare of all men and improve understanding among nations. -JFK, 1961

The Republic of Korea fulfilled that dream some four decades later, the first and only Peace Corps host country to become a sending country for international volunteers. They dispatch hundreds of volunteers each year, the World Friends Korea, through the Korea International Cooperation Agency. 

Stephens, the first woman U.S. Ambassador to Korea, and the only one up to that point who spoke Korean, made an early stop during her tenure as ambassador to Yesan where she taught as a volunteer from 1975-77.

 

To follow Stephens’ and others’ stories from Profiles in Service, consider subscribing below. And please share your thoughts in the comments section. Thank you.

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