Peace Corps Prep Reflection

Steps

• Step 1: Choose your audience

  Are you showing this to employers, Peace Corps Officials, or family?

  We think it is a good idea to create a site that can be used for professional purposes in your career and/or graduate school recruitment and application process. You can also create a fun portfolio to show off to friends and family.

  Showcasing to employers or Peace Corps Officials

  An effective strategy to getting a message across to a potential employer is a more brief and targeted description of what employable skills you obtained on study abroad. Be sure to use appropriate photos and stray from informal or casual language.

  Showcasing to friends and family

  If you want to produce a site that’s for friends and family, or just one that is fun to put together to earn your certificate that’s fine too!

• Step 2: Choose your platform

  Take your pick at having a customizable site or a more formatted presentation.

  Customize your own site

  You may choose to use any free website builder for your ePortfolio. These platforms are highly customizable and provide many creative options to control the look and feel of your ePortfolio. Some popular choices are WordPress, Wix, and Weebly.

  FIU Portfolium

  FIU provides all students with a free Portfolio account. Portfolium allows you to document all of your skills and accomplishments online in an easy-to-use standardized format. This platform does not allow for customization.

  Access the FIU Portfolium portal

• Step 3: Course Experiences

  Select at least one course from your Sector experience AND one course from your Intercultural competencies to reflect on. (approx 250 words)

  As you reflect on a significant experiences from each category, consider:

  • Hard or soft skills you developed
  • Significant personal or perspective changes
  • Points of pride or challenges you overcame
  • Your ability to represent the U.S as a cultural ambassador abroad.
  • Include any significant samples of your work, such as research papers and PowerPoint presentations, which are high quality representative of your learning in these courses.
  • Or tell a story about something you learned in a class which shaped your perspective on the world. 
• Step 4: Hands-on experience

  Tell us about your hands-on sector experiences! Be descriptive and showcase what you've learned.

  • Include any photos or artifacts (timelines, lesson plans, or other articles that you used to complete your project) to showcase your work.
  • Reflect on the experience (approx 500 words) You can use the following questions as a starting point:
    • What issue(s) did your project/ experience address?
    • Why did you choose to address them and what have you learned from completing your project(s)?
    • Did you gain more awareness and perspective of global issues or at least of the issue(s) you tackled on a global scale? How so?
    • Discussion of select, significant workshops, panels, or other Prep-related activities you participated in.
    • From your time in the program, what do you think are the benefits of being a part of the Peace Corps or Peace Corps Prep in general?

  Resources

  Name specific skills you gained or improved. Do you feel highly competent in one or more? Explain how in your reflection.

  • Student Leadership Competencies

  
  

   

• Step 5: Market yourself

  Brand yourself through your resume, interests, passions and marketable skills.

  • Detail your post-graduation plans in your personal, academic, and/or professional life. You may want to allude to certain Peace Corps projects that you want to pursue.
  • Include a resume, formatted for web. Your resume can make or break opportunities, so it should be flawless! Please review our resume advice or sign up for a resume critique via FIU Handshake.
  • Include contact information. We recommend using a webform where individuals can contact you without your actual contact information being posted. You can choose to post your contact information but please consider the privacy implications that may come with that.
  • Be descriptive of self, including interests, passions, marketable skills, and any experiences not directly related to the Peace Corps Prep.
• Step 6: Review these important considerations

  Make sure you correctly name your degree. Most FIU students get this wrong!

  • The name of your degree usually consists of this formula: [Level of Degree] of [Arts/Sciences/etc.] in [Major]. Consider these examples
    • Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice
    • Bachelor of Business Administration in Human Resource Management
    • Master of Arts in English
  • Almost all FIU degrees are a Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science, with a few exceptions such as Bachelor of Business Administration. If you are not sure of the formal name of your degree, consult your academic department’s web site or FIU Degrees & Programs.
  • Bachelor and master are singular when naming the whole degree “Bachelor of Arts” but possessive when using the short form “Bachelor’s degree.” I find using the longform more appropriate on your resume.

  Also, did you type “I am about to graduate with my bachelor’s degree?” Don’t forget in a few short weeks to update it to “I recently graduated with my bachelor’s degree…” If you want to go ahead and do it now so it doesn’t fall out of date, that’s okay.

  Finally, active voice both puts you at the center of the story and gets more directly to the point. Go over the prose narrative you have included throughout your ePortfolio to identify unnecessary use of passive voice that can be edited.

  Learn more about using active voice at Purdue Owl.