Peace Corps Recruits Older Volunteers

The Peace Corps is reshaping its training, placement, and recruiting methods to attract more older volunteers, reports The Seattle Times.

Hoping to lure more baby boomers to its ranks, the Peace Corps plans to try to raise the number of volunteers ages 50 and older from 5 percent of the 7,749 American volunteers to 15 percent over the next two years. They will place older volunteers in nine countries to evaluate the new effort.

“The older person can set a good example for the younger volunteers on how to really remember the Peace Corps is a 24/7 job,” said former Peace Corps member Linda Perry, 64, who served three years in Bulgaria.

The organization will tailor its placements so that older volunteers will be closer to medical facilities, publicize its recruitment in magazines and publications that serve older people, and be more sensitive to their older volunteers’ needs.

For more about nonprofit efforts to lure older volunteers, see The Chronicle’s Regeneration section.