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Austin Betz ’17, a French and global studies double major and German minor, has been accepted into the Peace Corps.

As an undergraduate, Betz has lived and studied in Paris, France, and Graz, Austria, through ������ý����'s Center for International Education (CIE) and spent winters in Belgium living with host families and friends.

"I developed an obsession with traveling, meeting and educating people around the world and learning and adapting to foreign cultures," he says. "I felt the Peace Corps would be the best, most productive and rewarding challenge of my career."

Betz will leave for his new adventure on June 11, 2017, for northwest Africa in a village outside of Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso.

“I will be in a host family’s hut for three months of pre-service training, after which I will be taken to my village," he says. "I will be provided with a two-room mud hut with thatched roofing, which has no running water or electricity. The Peace Corps organizes everything from my service location, training, housing and transportation."

More than 220,000 volunteers have served in the Peace Corps since its founding in 1961. In announcing the program, President John F. Kennedy said its mission was to promote world peace and friendship through service abroad. Peace Corpx volunteers work at a grassroots level to help advance social and economic development. They have worked in 141 countries since the program's founding. For the volunteers, the experience often leads to broadened world view and, once they return home, new career possibilities.

The thorough and lengthy application process for the Peace Corps required Betz to submit medical reviews and undergo full background checks and a hour-long interview. “It took a few months to apply, considering I had to apply one year before my desired departure date from a selection of countries and sectors, as well as an ongoing application and invitation process,” Betz says.

Practically a year after making up his mind and applying for the Peace Corps, he heard the great news this summer while enjoying his last day of a two-months road trip with friends. “Learning that I will be traveling again at the end of my last trip was very exciting and a little overwhelming,” says Betz, who had been planning to teach English and French. His new plans took shape once the Peace Corps decided to make him a community economic development volunteer.

"On top of teaching agriculture and foreign languages in local schools and helping the progression youth and gender equality programs, my main priority would be aiding local farmers to start small-to-large scale businesses to aid in their exportation of cotton and soy," he says. "We are trained online throughout our application and invitation process on everything from how to live and survive day to day, learn the local language of our villages (mine being Mooré and French) and how to perform well in our sectors."

Betz said he always knew he wanted to join the ������ý���� community, especially because of his family connections to the University. His uncle Sean Kildea ’93, ’01 is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Communication and Journalism who earned his bachelor’s and master’s from ������ý���� before going on to earn his doctorate from Rutgers University.

“The best assets of ������ý���� are the enormous network of alumni, the endless, amazing opportunities to travel and learn abroad through the CIE, and the thorough courses on world culture, language, literature, history and politics, which taught me to truly appreciate the world around me,” says Betz.

He plans on returning to America in September 2019.