34 UD Peace Corps trainees begin Service Journey in Sri Lanka
COLOMBO – Thirty-four US Peace Corps trainee volunteers have arrived in Sri Lanka to begin preparations for two years of service in the Northern and North Central Provinces, where they will support English-language education in local schools.
The trainees will undergo intensive training in Sinhala or Tamil, Sri Lankan culture and American English-language teaching before taking the Peace Corps Pledge of Service in November.
Following their swearing-in, the volunteers will work alongside Sri Lankan teachers and students to strengthen English-language education while living with Sri Lankan host families and becoming part of the communities where they are assigned.
US Ambassador to Sri Lanka Eric Meyer welcomed the new trainees at the Peace Corps office in Colombo, saying the strongest connections between the two countries were built through people-to-people engagement.
“As they become part of the communities they serve, these new Volunteers will build skills and connections that can open doors to economic opportunity and bring our two democracies closer together across the Indo-Pacific,” Meyer said.
The Peace Corps first began operating in Sri Lanka in 1962, when the first US volunteers arrived at the invitation of the Sri Lankan government.
More than 500 American volunteers have since served in Sri Lanka in areas including education, health, agriculture, community development and tsunami recovery.
The program was formally re-established in Sri Lanka in 2018 with a renewed focus on English-language education.
The latest group will continue that more than six-decade history of US volunteer service in Sri Lanka when they begin working in local communities later this year.
The Peace Corps, established in 1961, is a US Government international volunteer agency that sends American volunteers abroad to work with communities on projects aligned with the priorities of both the United States and host countries.
The agency says nearly 250,000 volunteers have served in 144 countries since its establishment.
–ENCL
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