在线英语听力室

Peace Corps at 50: Same Mission of Aid, Just Smaller

时间:2011-03-30 05:10:22

搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号:tingroom,领取免费英语资料大礼包。

(单词翻译)

STEVE EMBER: Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I’m Steve Ember.
FAITH LAPIDUS: And I'm Faith Lapidus. Americans who volunteer for the Peace Corps1 get a chance to help improve lives in developing countries. They also get a chance to learn more about the world, and about themselves. This week on our show, we take a look at this program which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary.
(MUSIC)
STEVE EMBER: President John Kennedy established the Peace Corps soon after he took office in nineteen sixty-one. It was the time of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet2 Union.
The new program gave Americans a chance to answer the call to service that the president made in his inaugural3 speech. "Ask not what your country can do for you," he said. "Ask what you can do for your country."
Kennedy told Peace Corps volunteers that America's image in the countries where they were going would depend largely on them.
President John Kennedy speaks to Peace Corps volunteers in the White House Rose Garden August 28, 1961
JOHN KENNEDY: "And if you impress them with your commitment to freedom, to the advancement4 of the interests of people everywhere, to your pride in your country and its best traditions, and what it stands for, the influence may be far-reaching."
FAITH LAPIDUS: On August thirtieth, nineteen sixty-one, the first group of fifty-one Peace Corps volunteers arrived in Accra, Ghana, to serve as teachers. They had agreed to work for almost no pay. They would spend two years in Ghana helping5 its people and learning the reality of life in a developing country.
Most of the volunteers had just completed college. About half of them taught English or health care.
STEVE EMBER: In the fifty years since then, more than two hundred thousand Americans have served as Peace Corps volunteers. They have worked in one hundred thirty-nine countries.
The Peace Corps is a government agency that was created to promote world peace and friendship. There are three goals: First, to help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women. Second, to help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the people served. And, third, to help promote a better understanding of other people on the part of Americans.
(MUSIC)
FAITH LAPIDUS: By nineteen sixty-six, there were almost sixteen thousand volunteers and trainees6. This was the height of the Peace Corps' popularity. It was also around the time when many young men were seeking an alternative to military service because of the Vietnam War.
Today, the Peace Corps has more than eight thousand volunteers and trainees in seventy-seven countries. They work in agriculture, economic development, education, the environment and health care. Some work in programs related to youth development.
The agriculture programs are designed to teach people how to produce food while protecting natural resources. In Thailand, for example, volunteers have taught farmers how to improve soil conditions. And in parts of Central Africa, Peace Corps volunteers have taught farmers how to raise freshwater fish.
STEVE EMBER: Sixty percent of current Peace Corps volunteers are women. The average age of a volunteer is twenty-eight. But the ages of Peace Corps volunteers range from eighteen to eighty-six. Some Americans join the Peace Corps after they retire.
Today seven percent of volunteers are over the age of fifty. And nineteen percent are members of minority groups.
This year's budget for the agency is four hundred million dollars.
FAITH LAPIDUS: Allegra Troiano is based in Costa Rica as a regional adviser7 for the Teaching English as a Foreign Language program of the Peace Corps. She says the way Peace Corps volunteers teach English has changed.
In the past, volunteers were placed in a classroom to teach English by themselves. But now, Ms. Troiano says the aim is to work with local teachers to provide what is known as co-teaching.
ALLEGRA TROIANO: "In teaching English as a second language, the goal is to put Peace Corps volunteers in classes with host country national teachers. So they have established that this model of co-teaching is the most sustainable."
She says the Peace Corps is currently expanding programs in countries like Costa Rica to meet growing demand for English teaching.
ALLEGRA TROIANO: "It’s the way to communicate with the global world. So I think there's a great need and I think there's also a great desire."
(MUSIC)
STEVE EMBER: One former volunteer is Aaron Williams. He is now the director of the Peace Corps.
AARON WILLIAMS: "Everywhere I go, I find the leadership met a Peace Corps volunteer many, many years ago and that had a really positive impact, a transformative experience in their lives -- prime ministers, presidents, cabinet officials, leaders of large companies in the countries where we serve.”
Volunteers in one of the newest programs live and work in rural communities in Indonesia. One of the volunteers, Nisha Skariah, recently completed college. Like other volunteers, she says she wants to contribute to a better world.
Nisha Skariah, a recent college graduate from Texas, has come to Indonesia both to teach and to learn
NISHA SKARIAH: "I mean I am still really young and still trying to make my way in the world and trying to figure out exactly what I want to do, and this gives me a little opportunity to focus what I know and what I have done in my life, even with my little experience, and make a big change out of that."
What separates the Peace Corps from other American assistance programs is that the volunteers become part of the community where they work. Teachers like Nisha Skariah live with local families and make the same wages as other teachers.
Volunteers say they gain at least as much from their experience as they give. Ms. Skariah is teaching Indonesians but also learning about the culture of a country with the world's largest Muslim population.
NISHA SKARIAH: "I expected a lot more conservative, maybe a little more, the people and the culture to be a little more restrictive but everyone has been so open and so welcoming and they really embraced me as one of their own. And I am really grateful for that because it makes me feel like I am at home."
FAITH LAPIDUS: John Williams is a former volunteer who is now the Peace Corps director in Thailand. He says the return for the United States on its investment in the Peace Corps is an increased understanding of the world beyond its borders.
Mr. Williams says the personal connections that volunteers make are just as important as the knowledge they bring. This is true, he says, whether they are teaching, working in health centers or assisting farmers.
JOHN WILLIAMS: "The encouragement that they give to a student or a farmer, or a woman in a weaving group, or a person living with AIDS who thinks nobody cares about them. These are the people that Peace Corps volunteers typically work with. Peace Corps volunteers don't come with a lot of material resources, but they come with a lot of heart."
STEVE EMBER: But the Peace Corps is not without problems. Some volunteers say they have been victims of sexual abuse in countries where they worked. And in March of two thousand nine, a twenty-four-year-old volunteer teaching English, Kate Puzey, was killed in Benin.
The suspect, a citizen of Benin, had been dismissed from a job with the Peace Corps. Ms. Puzey had accused him of sexually abusing girls at a school. The suspect says he is innocent. Ms. Puzey's family recently told ABC News that agency officials had let him know about her part in his dismissal, and later tried to keep the case quiet.
Peace Corps Deputy Director Carrie Hessler-Radelet recently spoke8 with VOA's Carol Castiel about the issue of safety.
CARRIE HESSLER-RADELET: "Safety and security of our volunteers is absolutely our top priority and we are continually looking at this topic and I have to say that in the last few years we have done an amazing amount of work to try to improve both our systems to support volunteers, to ensure confidentiality9 and to strengthen their preparedness and training."
At the same time, she says a volunteer must be prepared for risks.
CARRIE HESSLER-RADELET: "Honestly I feel quite confident that actually volunteers have never been as safe in the Peace Corps as they are today. I mean I have no qualms10 in saying that, because our systems are strong. That said, you know, there is risk to serving as a volunteer, you are in remote areas, the medical care isn't what you would expect here in this country."
FAITH LAPIDUS: Matt Francolino is a new volunteer. He spent last summer living much like he will live in the Peace Corps -- in a rural village in West Africa. He had no electricity, but he says it was the best time of his life.
MATT FRANCOLINO: "And I wondered to myself, how is that possible? I didn’t have my cellphone, no computer access, and I realized there were so many more important things that I was looking for in life.”
Last year thirty-seven percent of Peace Corps volunteers were serving in Africa and twenty-four percent in Latin America. The next largest group, twenty-one percent, were serving in Eastern Europe or Central Asia. There are also Peace Corps volunteers in other parts of Asia and the Pacific and in the Caribbean and the Middle East.
But not every volunteer is able to live and work in another culture, far from home. Some Peace Corps volunteers return to the United States early.
STEVE EMBER: People who served in the Peace Corps often say it was the hardest experience of their lives but also the best experience.
Alex Gordon volunteered in the early nineteen nineties. He has a box full of things that he kept from the two years he spent building a rural school in Paraguay.
ALEX GORDON: "It brings back a whole lot of memories."
Mr. Gordon says volunteering in the Peace Corps is about more than doing good in the world.
ALEX GORDON: "It gives you the confidence that you can really do anything."
And that includes volunteering a second time for the Peace Corps. This time, Alex Gordon will live and work in Liberia.
(MUSIC)
FAITH LAPIDUS: Our program was written and produced by Brianna Blake. I’m Faith Lapidus.
STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember. You can find transcripts11 and MP3s of our programs along with photos and videos at voaspecialenglish.com. Also check out the all-new mobile version of our site from your phone or other device. And we hope you can join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.


分享到:


点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 corps pzzxv     
n.(通信等兵种的)部队;(同类作的)一组
参考例句:
  • The medical corps were cited for bravery in combat.医疗队由于在战场上的英勇表现而受嘉奖。
  • When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时,他自愿参加了海军陆战队。
2 Soviet Sw9wR     
adj.苏联的,苏维埃的;n.苏维埃
参考例句:
  • Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
  • Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。
3 inaugural 7cRzQ     
adj.就职的;n.就职典礼
参考例句:
  • We listened to the President's inaugural speech on the radio yesterday.昨天我们通过无线电听了总统的就职演说。
  • Professor Pearson gave the inaugural lecture in the new lecture theatre.皮尔逊教授在新的阶梯讲堂发表了启用演说。
4 advancement tzgziL     
n.前进,促进,提升
参考例句:
  • His new contribution to the advancement of physiology was well appreciated.他对生理学发展的新贡献获得高度赞赏。
  • The aim of a university should be the advancement of learning.大学的目标应是促进学术。
5 helping 2rGzDc     
n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的,辅助的
参考例句:
  • The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
  • By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。
6 trainees 576ef87c519dfddb06b6987e1e66077f     
新兵( trainee的名词复数 ); 练习生; 接受训练的人; 训练中的动物
参考例句:
  • We've taken on our full complement of new trainees. 我们招收的新学员已经满额了。
  • The trainees were put through an assault course. 受训人员接受了突击训练课程。
7 adviser HznziU     
n.劝告者,顾问
参考例句:
  • They employed me as an adviser.他们聘请我当顾问。
  • Our department has engaged a foreign teacher as phonetic adviser.我们系已经聘请了一位外籍老师作为语音顾问。
8 spoke XryyC     
n.(车轮的)辐条;轮辐;破坏某人的计划;阻挠某人的行动 v.讲,谈(speak的过去式);说;演说;从某种观点来说
参考例句:
  • They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
  • The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。
9 confidentiality 7Y2yc     
n.秘而不宣,保密
参考例句:
  • They signed a confidentiality agreement. 他们签署了一份保守机密的协议。
  • Cryptography is the foundation of supporting authentication, integrality and confidentiality. 而密码学是支持认证、完整性和机密性机制的基础。
10 qualms qualms     
n.不安;内疚
参考例句:
  • He felt no qualms about borrowing money from friends.他没有对于从朋友那里借钱感到不安。
  • He has no qualms about lying.他撒谎毫不内疚。
11 transcripts 525c0b10bb61e5ddfdd47d7faa92db26     
n.抄本( transcript的名词复数 );转写本;文字本;副本
参考例句:
  • Like mRNA, both tRNA and rRNA are transcripts of chromosomal DNA. tRNA及rRNA同mRNA一样,都是染色体DNA的转录产物。 来自辞典例句
  • You can't take the transfer students'exam without your transcripts. 没有成绩证明书,你就不能参加转学考试。 来自辞典例句

本文本内容来源于互联网抓取和网友提交,仅供参考,部分栏目没有内容,如果您有更合适的内容,欢迎 点击提交 分享给大家。