Above: Peace Corps fellow Ursula Pike, left, is working for the Southernmost Illinois Delta Empowerment Zone, or SIDEZ. Her boss, Donna Raynalds, is pictured with her. Raynalds is a veteran Peace Corps Fellow herself. With them is Ron Medlin, member services director for Southern Illinois Electric Cooperative (SIEC), and Senator Dick Durbin. SIDEZ and SIEC often work together to improve the lot of southernmost Illinoisans.

Story and photos by Jack Halstead

Not all that long ago, Seattle native and Peace Corps volunteer Rebecca "Becky" Shaw was in the tiny African nation of Lesotho, helping that country solve its soil erosion problems through a program of tree planting and barrier-building to slow water flow. Now, she's beginning a year-long stint in rural Illinois, helping make life better for the people of a six-county area in southeastern Illinois.

Most of us who remember the Peace Corps recall the young people, most of them fresh out of college, who took some hands-on training and set out at the behest of the late President John F. Kennedy to make the world a better place.

For years, that's exactly what happened. Many of America's best and brightest went to developing nations and helped with all kinds of problems. They taught sanitation, cropping methods, animal husbandry and dozens of other topics, all in the local environment, and using local materials, as much as possible.

For the most part, it was a young idealist's game, and the cynics and old folks stayed home. All that changed when Lillian Carter, the mother of former President Jimmy Carter, joined the Peace Corps.

She proved at least two things with her service, an important one being that idealism is not the province of just the young, and also that people with gray hair and wrinkles can still be useful.

Becky, who's working out of the Albion (Edwards County) office of the Greater Wabash Regional Planning Commission, is working to help people, too. She's trying to locate sub-par homes in the area, so she can prepare a grant proposal to have contractors hired to bring such housing up to statespecifications.

Royce Carter, manager of member services and economic development for Wayne-White Counties Electric Cooperative, Fairfield, chairs the planning commission's board. He works with Becky and her supervisor, Lisa Michels, to help with economic development efforts in Edwards, Lawrence, Richland, Wabash, Wayne and White counties.

Ursula Pike, an Oregon native, is hard at work for the Southernmost Illinois Delta Empowerment Zone, or SIDEZ, an organization striving to improve things in the five southernmost — and poorest — counties in the state.

And she feels right at home. She's working for another Peace Corps veteran — and former Peace Corps fellow — Donna Raynalds, executive director of SIDEZ. The

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organization's territory closely parallels that of Southern Illinois Electric Cooperative (SIEC). Larry Lovell, general manager, and Ron Medlin, member services director, work closely with SIDEZ, helping when they can.

How, you might ask, did young women from Seattle and Oregon come to be working in Illinois after spending a couple of years halfway around the world?

Becky and Ursula, both Peace Corps veterans, are part of the Western Illinois University's (WIU) Peace Corps Fellows program. The program is designed to match up young, idealistic people with proven problem-solving skills with communities that need help with economic and community development.

But why are these young people from other states in Illinois? That's a good question, and a major part of the answer is that Illinois has one of the best such programs in the country. While some states have similar programs, others have less of a "nuts-and-bolts" focus, and tend to be a little more academic.

And Becky and Ursula are but a couple of the young and not-so-young people who have fanned out to help Illinois communities and other entities solve problems.

"A lot of people know that the Peace Corps was intended to help developing nations," says Lee Eavy, who's with the Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs (IIRA), which runs the Peace Corps Fellows program, "but there was more to it than that, and there still is.

"President Kennedy wanted people to go help other countries, and that was a major part. But they were to benefit from their exposure to other people and cultures, too. Then, they were to come back and use the skills they learned to make America a better place. It wasn't just a one-way street. That's really what the fellows program is all about."

At any rate, while the Peace Corps is not nearly as high profile as it used to be — nor as young — it's still busy cranking out people who can solve problems, and there are several of them earning masters' degrees at WIU.

Their work in rural communities is part of their efforts to earn advanced degrees. It is also incredibly important to those small-town leaders who don't know how to go about community improvement, want to do something, but who can't afford to hire expensive consultants.

Ron Trillet, a community leader in Watseka, a town of some 5,000 about 100 miles straight south of Chicago, can't say enough nice things about the Peace Corps fellow that town has had for the last year.

"Our fellow was Barbara Bauman-Eavy, or B.J." he says, "and she was a delight to work with. We got an awful lot done in the year she was with us, and she played a major part in all we accomplished."

B.J. is one of those Peace Corps vets who belie the old image of bright-eyed bushy-tailed, eager kids going out to help improve the world.

One part of community building is raising civic pride and consciousness, and Ursula Pike works at that by handing out circulars announcing a logo design contest for SIDEZ -and a signup sheet for volunteers who want to help with community betterment.

"When President Kennedy asked for volunteers to go to other countries to help people less fortunate than us, it really struck a responsive chord in me," she says, "but I had a baby and couldn't go. I made up my mind that I'd go as soon as I could."

President Kennedy wanted people to go help other countries, and that was a major part. But they were to benefit from their exposure to other people and cultures, too. Then, they were to come back and use the skills they learned to make America a better place. It wasn't just a one-way street. That's really what the fellows program is all about.

Years later, after 20-25 years of child-rearing, supervisory jobs and business ownership, she went, proving again that while idealism is essential, youth is merely optional.

Some of Watseka's accomplishments that B.J. helped with included the funding of a new park, the retention of an employer who was thinking about leaving town, a summer activity program for young people, an addition to the town's hospital and several other projects. The hospital, Trillet notes, was particularly important. As other area hospitals have folded, Watseka's has taken up the slack. It needed to evolve into a regional health-care facility if it was to be able to adequately serve an ever-expanding area.

While Becky and Ursula are just getting involved in their work, B.J.'s just winding up her stint with Watseka. There are

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others in the program, too. Heather Atkinson, a New York native, worked in Nepal, helping at-risk youths with employment training. She's now helping the Village of Annawan. Joel Haskard, a native of Hutchinson, Kansas, is back from teaching in Bulgaria, and he's working with the people of Havana to help that Illinois River community improve its economic prospects.

Terry Hall, who has just recently shaken the dust of Tanzania off his shoes, is helping the Knox County Soil and Water Conservation District as it works on its Court Creek Watershed Management Project. A native of Benton, Utah, he taught in Tanzania and helped with conservation efforts.

Kent Jarcik, who just wound up a tour of teaching in Slovakia, is now working with Marianne Adams in Pike County and Pat Curry in Springfield to help with Pike County's economic development efforts. He's from Kingman, Arizona.

While all these people were successful at solving problems most of us never even dream of, those who work in the Peace Corps fellows program are quick to emphasize that they are not miracle workers, and that they're not superhuman.

Trillet, the Watseka leader, notes that his community leaders may have forgotten that fact a time or two.

"You have to stop once in a while and step back and remember that your helper is not a savior who's going to come into town and do all the work. Chances are, there'll be a lot more work to be done after they arrive and get busy.

Many people sat through sun and speeches at the kickoff of one of SIDEZ'5 events, and SIEC was involved. G. Robert Inman, president of the co-op's board, is at right and center of this photo.

"There'll be new ideas to look at, people to recruit and motivate and a lot of other things. I can't tell you too strongly how much of a help B.J. was, but we all had to do a lot, too."

The folks who run the Peace Corps fellows program are very upfront about that. They want communities to know that they have to have a good grass-roots movement going and a very solid, achievable vision of where they want the community to go, before the fellow can do them much good.

A few years ago, the slogan "Don't work harder, work smarter," was in vogue, and the fellows have taken it and added a new twist to it. The idea behind the program, essentially, is to show communities how to work both smarter and harder.

Often, there's some confusion regarding who the Peace Corps fellow works for, and they're often thought to be employees of the mayor, the chamber of commerce, or some other organization. Often, there's some suspicion that a fellow has adopted "the other guy's" agenda.

Peace Corps Fellows are quick to debunk that idea, and insist that they try to guide and direct, and facilitate as much as possible. But their primary agenda is to do the best for their town that they can, both in the planning stages and in the long, tedious grunt-work process that follows.

While they try to steer visionaries away from pie-in-the-sky ideas and toward the feasible, they do more legwork and facilitating than actual visioning. That's for the people who invite them to come.

The Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs' Lee Eavy notes that the program got off the ground in Illinois about seven years ago, with Western Illinois University and Illinois State University having similar programs with some minor differences.

"Probably the biggest difference between the two programs is that the one at ISU tends to be a little more urban than ours," he says.

He notes that IIRA is now working with a group in South Dakota to clone the program there. "There are several states that have programs," he says, "and one of the reasons South Dakota chose to come here is that they thought our program was one of the best.

"I happen to agree with them, and I think their faith in us reflects well on us. We do have a good track record of turning out good Peace Corps fellows."

While it seems crass to even mention money, it is a fact of life that money does help in the economic development process, and Eavy remarks that it costs a community some $15,000 to field a fellow for a year.

Those communities interested in investing in a fellow, or in learning more about the program, can contact Lee Eavy at the Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs. The address there is Stipes Hall, Western Illinois University, Macomb, IL 61455-1390. The phone number is (309) 298-2268, and Eavy's e-mail address is l-eavy@wiu.edu.

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