Site Guilt

Among many Peace Corps volunteers, both in Panama and other countries, there exists a phenomenon known as site guilt. We volunteers are placed in one community, our site, where we live and work for our two-year service. Several volunteers get lucky and are placed in sites with active community members, well-established programs ready to embrace a volunteer's participation, suggestions, or expertise, willing counterparts, and program sectors that build off work already done. On the other hand, some volunteers get placed in communities whose community members may seem hostile or unwelcoming, counterparts unwilling to adapt or open their minds to new ideas, or sites that simply do not have any initiative under way, which is a mammoth void for the Peace Corps volunteer to fill. Being the first volunteer in a community often creates this scenario, or being the first in a new sector, such as my own. Most of us fall somewhere in between that space of ideal and nightmarish site.

If you have a troublesome site, you may struggle to complete projects, and therefore, to feel accomplished in your service. Volunteers, much like myself, often seek time out of site to find activities and projects that allow them to feel needed, to feel relevant. For example, the majority of my work has been through GAD initiatives, the camps and youth workshops I have done. I should be very content that I have found something that allows me to use my knowledge and skills to serve this country and my own. However, I always have something in the back of my mind reminding me what I kinda sorta should be doing: Teaching English volunteer. My primary sector work, Teaching English, is almost nonexistent because my teachers are content with their way of doing things. Although my experience and training have armed me with a plethora of methods, ideas, and activities, my skills have stayed, for the most part, on the shelf because I do not collaborate with teachers in the way I can, or should. Teachers here are often unaccustomed or uncomfortable with the level of work volunteers suggest and attempt to implement. So after struggling for a while, I have decided to back off and work in other ways at the school. My work with the elementary English teacher is limited. I now teach a computer class (basic typing) for 4th, 5th, and 6th grade students, and try to instill discipline and proper classroom behavior during my time with them. Hopefully, that will help. Yet, as my sector is called Teaching English, I feel like that's what my main work should be. Cue the guilt.

Whenever a volunteer leaves his or her site, even if it's to collaborate on another volunteer's project, we feel guilty. Like we should be doing more work where we are "supposed to be" working, trying harder, pressing our counterparts. We may struggle to get people to care in our sites, but we feel that it's our cross to bear, since the Peace Corps has placed us here. What else can we do but keep fighting? Aquí en la lucha, here in the fight, we keep grinding. Every time I leave site, either to work on GAD things or to work on a new project I'm doing (which I'll explain later), I feel like my site is missing out on an important resource: me. But of course, it's partially my fault for not being assertive enough, or trying hard enough. Or is it? We vacillate between blaming ourselves and our circumstances. Honestly, blame is shared between many parties, which includes volunteers, host country nationals, and the organization. Often, sites are developed without proper research. Volunteers are assigned based on connections between government officials, principals, teachers, or whatever else. Nepotism can doom a volunteer to a site whose teachers want to look elite with an American's presence in the school, but who will not take the time out of their schedule to plan their lessons with the volunteer. What can we do? I mean, what can we DO?

We do what we can. Although most of the time I may feel like I'm doing very little, it's not true. I think this blog has already demonstrated that. Coming home and explaining my work to friends and family also allows me to step outside myself and realize that.

So the time I'm spending here is not fruitless, although I may occasionally feel that way. That desire for more, for relevance and accomplishment, is exactly what proves that our hearts are in the right place.