The Peace Corps, The Compact Agreement, and Why I’m Here

During staging and training, we’ve been getting lots of information about the Peace Corps and Micronesia. Here’s a little debrief on what I’ve learned so far and essentially why I’m here! Sorry if this post is a little boring for people – I promise to post snorkeling photos soon! 

The Peace Corps has three goals:

1. “To help the peoples of interested countries in meeting their needs for trained manpower, particularly in meeting the basic needs of those living in the poorest areas of such countries”
2. “To help promote a better understanding of the American people on the part of the peoples served”
3. “To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of the American people”

The first goal is related to our specific assignments – the Federated States of Micronesia has asked Peace Corps to focus on education, so I will be both teaching and training local teachers in effective interactive learning. The current education status is dismal – over 90% of students fail their standardized tests in 8^th and 10^th grade. Since English is the official second language of the country, classes from 5^th grade on are taught primarily in English. Although it sounds kind of imperialistic (and it is based on a rather imperialistic past with the United States), being able to speak English is essential for communication between the states (each has several distinct local languages), for getting a job in the government (80% of jobs here), and for any sort of future outside of their island (there’s only one university in Micronesia, so many come to the United States for college). We’re offering the students another tool to expand their options. Training the teachers is another important aspect because of the unique education challenges in Micronesia. All the textbooks are from the United States, so the content is often too difficult for ESL students (not to mention irrelevant – what Pacific Islander needs to read about the Alamo?). We’re currently being trained in how to adapt these materials into a format more applicable to ESL learners, and we’ll be working with co-teachers to implement them.

The second and third goal are much more vague. Basically I need to hang out with lots of people and give them a good impression of the country I represent. I need to integrate as fully as possible into the local culture and learn as much as I can about Micronesia. The Peace Corps encourages us to keep blogs (provided we include the necessary disclaimer – see below) because it can be an element of fulfilling the third goal. I can’t think of many people that know anything about Micronesia in the states – I certainly wouldn’t have been able to point it out on a map before I received my invitation! (I’m pretty sure some maps don’t even include the FSM…) But the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) is actually incredibly relevant to the United States because of the Compact Agreement between the two countries.

The American ambassador talked to our group last week about this agreement (small country=getting to meet people with important titles – a former president of the FSM is speaking with us in a few weeks). The most important aspects of this unique agreement are:

-FSM is an autonomous country with self-government

-Micronesians can live, work, study, etc. in the United States freely and without a visa

-The United States military has full responsibility for the safety and defense of FSM

-Micronesians can serve in the United States military

-FSM cannot allow a third party’s military to enter their waters without permission from the United States

-The United States offers economic assistance to FSM through grants and federal services (United States Postal Service, Head Start, FDIC, etc)

The economic assistance is the only part of the agreement with an expiration date, so it’s technically a separate entity from the Compact Agreement, but I’m lumping them together because everyone basically thinks of them as one and the same. The amount of economic aid is truly astounding. We give about $200 million/year, which amounts to $2,000 per capita (Afghanistan, in contrast, receives about $50 per capita in foreign aid). Since its implementation in 1986, the US has given approximately $2 billion. 

Why do we fork out so much money to some tiny country most people haven’t even heard of? Location, location, location! After WWII, the United Nations “gave” the entire Micronesia region to the United States as a trust. When FSM sought self-government, the US really didn’t want another country to be able to swoop in and control the region (when you include the waters, the region is huge). $2 billion is a relatively small price to pay to control a huge strategic stretch of the Pacific. 

What’s the really bad part of all this? The money hasn’t really made a difference! It’s really only created a relationship of dependency. US grant money funds the entire education, health, and infrastructure sectors of the economy, as well as others. The Micronesian economy is almost entirely based on the public sector, which is basically paid for by us. Without any growth in the private sector, GDP has hardly grown at all in the past 30 years. The current foreign aid package to FSM expires in 2023. If we don’t renew the grants then, the entire Micronesian economy will collapse. And even if we do renew it, we will simply be perpetuating the dependency. It’s a huge problem, and the agreement really needs to be significantly altered (ie somehow promoting growth in the private sector) to make any of the impacts of our aid sustainable in the long run.

So how will my Peace Corps service solve these problems. Bottom line: it won’t. We were all warned that our idealistic notions of saving the world would come crashing down the moment we got started – our role is to promote small change one community at a time. I’ll be helping to motivate the students and teachers at one school to value education and to improve their English. Ren, our country director, told us that many of the Micronesians in the government who are trying to solve the country’s problems have said that they attribute their success in part to a Peace Corps teacher they had had as a student. The hope is that some of our students will be motivated to pursue higher education, and at least some of those students will choose to stay in FSM and work to improve the country in its weaker areas. Additionally, we hope the teachers we work with will be able to improve their English teaching. Hopefully our work here will have an indirect effect on the future of Micronesia.