Peace of my mind.

• Author: Williams, Aaron S.
• Position: Letter to the editor

As Peace Corps director, I was dismayed and saddened to learn about the negative experience Ryan Cooper details in "Good News First, Bad News Never" [March/April 2012], because the Peace Corps is dedicated to improving volunteer support and the effectiveness, consistency, and efficiency of operations. Mr. Cooper's article fell short, however, because he failed to provide a complete picture of the Peace Corps of the twenty-first century.

The author does himself a disservice by unfairly dismissing the Peace Corps 2010 Comprehensive Agency Assessment as a public relations ploy; many of the reforms it prompted address his criticisms.

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One of my first actions as director was to call for this first-of-its-kind, top-to-bottom analysis. I felt that after fifty years it was time for a good hard look at our operations. That is why I created a team of former and current country directors, and development experts, to lead the assessment, working with every post where volunteers serve.

The first action we took as a result of the assessment was an annual review of our entire country portfolio. We just completed the second review, using a set of clearly defined, rigorous criteria and data to look across our global presence. As part of this review, the organization takes a deliberate, evidence-based approach to inform our strategic decisions about potential new country entries, allocation of resources across countries, and possible country program reductions and graduations.

Next we created a new training program. This program standardized training and established global indicators to better track the impact of volunteers. Before the program, Peace Corps volunteers worked in many different project areas within six sectors in seventy-six countries around the world. Through work with countries, universities, and other NGOs, we have "focused in" on a manageable number of project areas.

We're also reviewing whether these are the technical areas that are most requested by our host countries; that they are projects evidence has shown to be the most effective in delivering results at the community level; and that they are projects volunteers can succeed in with the time they have in-country.

The Peace Corps also worked with Congress to codify several existing reforms and better support volunteers in the field, including hiring a victim's advocate, expanding sexual assault training to volunteers and staff, and establishing whistle-blowing...