Carolina Cardona (KNFP 15), Sub-regional Program and Training Coordinator, Peace Corps, Benin, West Africa.
This article was originally published in the March 2015 issue of the KFLA Newsletter.
Traveling internationally and learning another language during her Kellogg Fellowship reinforced Carolina Cardona's desire to live permanently abroad. "Since 1997, I haven't lived in the United States for more than a few months," she says by phone from Cameroon, one of five countries in West Africa where she will be assisting Peace Corps staff and volunteers.
Carolina recently moved to Benin from Honduras, where she was deputy director of Peace Corps Hondorus. "I know Peace Corps from the staff side and the volunteer side," she says, referring to her time as a Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras in 1985-1987, and to a stint as a staff member in Uzbekistan before her recent post in Honduras. Other positions outside of Peace Corps have taken her to Azerbaijan and El Salvador. A trained public health worker, Carolina describes her passion as "getting to know people from other cultures and learning other languages, and trying to figure out similarities and differences."
Her personal measure of success, she says, is "feeling I'm able to connect with someone and feel mutual respect, and to overcome language and cultural differences." She believes that the only way to go into a new culture and community is with an open mind: "You need to be patient, to listen, and to figure out what's working in the community and identify its strengths. You don't want to come in with any assumptions or an agenda and get too focused on results. Instead, it's about building relationships that connect you to the community. If Peace Corps volunteers learn the local language, listen, and build trust, everything else falls into place," she says. In her role as a program and training coordinator, Carolina works with staff "to look at ways to do programming that can have an impact."
Much of the work of Peace Corps volunteers is rooted in healthcare, education, and agriculture, but she stresses that projects vary from country to country and have their own particular nuances. She is proud of the strong HIV/AIDS training she helped enhance in Honduras. "I like the role of coordinating people and integrating programs," she says. "Now, working with five countries, I am their cheerleader and will promote what people can do together." Helping the volunteers to adjust to a completely different part of the world and a new culture is another important challenge of her work. For example, in the Western African countries where she is working, she describes, "In terms of comforts, there's no fast-food; there may be internet and cell phones connections, but there's not always coverage or access on a daily basis."
Carolina's advice to aspiring leaders in her field is: "Define what makes you happiest. Stay centered because there are a lot of distractions, which will throw you off course." She continues, "Find out what you do best then go out and do it as often as you can."