CSWE hosted the Peace Corps for a webinar highlighting how social work skills translate to Peace Corps service opportunities for both social work faculty and students. Dr. Darlene Grant, senior advisor to the Peace Corps director and former clinical social worker and social work faculty, and her colleagues discuss Peace Corps service, building connections through stories, and opportunities for social workers. 

Learning Objectives: 

1.Learn about Peace Corps volunteer opportunities

2. Connect the transferability of social work skills to Peace Corps service 

3. Understand experiences of returned Peace Corps volunteers

Presenter Bio:

In June 2020, Dr. Darlene Grant joined the Peace Corps Head Quarters Director’s Office as Senior Advisor. From June 2022 to February 2023, she left her office in Washington, DC for Ha Noi, Viet Nam to lead, as senior advisor, in this newest (143rd) Peace Corps program. The program welcomed its first group of volunteers in October 2023. Dr. Grant served as Peace Corps Country Director in Kosovo from 2015 to 2019, and as Country Director in Mongolia from 2012 to 2015. Grounding her career in tenets of conscious leadership for transformation, colleagues, family, and friends were not surprised when from 2009-2011, she took a leave of absence from her tenured faculty position to serve for 27-months as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Cambodia. There she partnered with 6 host country national teacher colleagues as a TEFL English Teacher and Teacher Trainer. Dr. Grant worked for 18-years as a professor of Social Work at the University of Texas at Austin. She taught graduate and undergraduate courses in social justice, clinical practice, research methodology, working with women with addiction and criminal justice involvement and at-risk youth. Dr. Grant was named 2006 Social Worker of the Year by the National Association of Social Workers.