All Volunteer Conference

I just spent two days at a hotel with 150 other Peace Corps Volunteers.  It was a bit overwhelming at first – I haven’t been around that many Americans in a long time.  But I finally met volunteers from the new group and reconnected with friends (from my training group) who I hadn’t seen in months.  :) 

The purpose of the conference was for volunteers to lead sessions about successful projects/activities at site and share knowledge with each other.  There was also a general meeting led by the Country Director about Peace Corps policies and another meeting with the Peace Corps Regional Security Director about safety and security in Kampala.

In my previous blog post I mentioned that I’m running out of ideas for work at Kuluva.  I talked to the other volunteers who are nursing schools and it sounds like we’re all struggling.  We’re stuck teaching computers because only qualified nurses are allowed to teach health/medicine (and we’re not nurses).  But before I request a site change, I’ve found a few potential opportunities for public health work in Arua.  I’ll check those out in October. 

Most of the sessions I attended at the All Volunteer Conference were about camps.  :)  After being a counselor at three camps, I’m probably not going to get picked to work at many more – the new PCVs need to have those opportunities too.  But my friend Aditi and I expressed an interest in being the directors for the next Girl Tech Camp – and it looks like that project is a ‘go’!  We’re going to start meeting and planning in October.  The Gender and Development (GAD) Committee that I’m on is making some good progress streamlining grant writing, timelines, and operations for all camps.  I always feel better after a GAD meeting or camp discussion because that's the area of work where I’m actually making a difference.  :)