я не понимаю!

PC Ukraine has three goals, wherever they serve:

1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women;
2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served; and,
3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

As you can probably guess, goal #1 references our actual work but goals #2 and #3 are about building relationships here and sharing our experiences with those back at home. Not one goal is more important than another and in a country where there is no such thing as "just business", we have found that building relationships in our community is as important, if not more so, than our actual assignments. Without relationships, it is impossible to accomplish even the simplest things in Ukraine; with them, it's possible to accomplish the impossible!

PC Ukraine has three programs to which a volunteer can be assigned:

Community Development (CD) – the least structured program in PC Ukraine. CD volunteers act like a free agent among organizations in town. They are assigned one primary partner organization, to which they are to dedicate 40% of their work week, and other secondary partners. Often CD volunteers have an office and a traditional 40-hour per week job. Others, however, work with small non-governmental organizations (NGOs), where the director may even work a different full-time job as a source of income. CD volunteers often work with non-profit organizations and city/village council.

Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) – the most structured program in PC Ukraine. Volunteers serve as English teachers and have a regular, full schedule of classes in an educational establishment. Like school in the U.S., the summer is open. In the summer, most TEFL volunteers travel around the country and work at camps for school kids.

Youth Development (YD) – a hybrid position of TEFL and CD. YD volunteers spend 40% of their work week at an educational establishment and have other partner organizations in the community. Their partner organizations are generally geared towards youth issues.

Contrary to what you might have garnered from our blog, our life as Peace Corps volunteers is more than playing board games and cards, traveling around the country, or socializing with Ukrainians. It's true that we do a lot of that too but if you came to this page, you're probably most interested in our actual assignments:

Michael is the first CD volunteer in our town. He spends the majority of his time working for his primary partner organization "Social Monitoring"—a small non-profit without office space or employees that educates the public on problems facing the community (litter, ecology, democracy, etc.). Much of his time is focused on organizational efforts like strategic planning and community identity and concretely, website development. With his other partner organizations, he is involved with community projects and skills training for small non-profits. Additionally, he runs a weekly English Club for young professionals wishing to work on conversational English and consults with schools on website development. 

Lauren is a YD volunteer and currently teaches eight classes a week and runs a weekly English club for students. Her school is for 7-11th graders and her classes focus on health related and civic topics, as well as American culture. Depending on the level of the class, she teaches in Russian, English, or a mix of the two. She wrote a small project grant to create a fitness center at the school, for the use of all secondary students in town, and is currently awaiting funding. She is the fourth PCV in 5 years at this school, and the second YD PCV. Her work with her secondary organizations has not been fully developed yet, though there is talk that one organization would like to build a youth parliament, a committee of active young adults (ages 18-30) working to effect positive change in their community.

• Other than teaching for TEFL and YD PCVs, don't expect that there will be much structured direction at your site, from your primary or secondary organizations. Most of the time, there will be a lot of opportunity to brainstorm new projects within the community and your colleagues will be counting on you to take the initiative.
• Many YD PCVs have only one partner organization, the primary hosting organization -- that's especially true in smaller villages. Most YD PCVs are hosted by an educational establishment and many are only involved in after-school activities, not in classroom teaching at all. 
• Training prepares YD PCVs to teach their classes in Russian or Ukrainian, but most schools prefer that the PCV teach in English, as TEFL PCVs will be required to do. The practicality of this request has to be weighed based on the PCV's Russian level and the students' English level.
• Whether for a CD, TEFL, or YD volunteer, most organizations apply for a PCV in the hopes of receiving temporary grant funding from PC for small projects. The PCV is responsible for writing the grant to secure funding and managing the funds and project.
• Know that every situation is different and don't base your expectations on what you read here. In fact, it's best not to have any expectations, if you can manage that!