| The Application Process Mine took 13 months, most take 9-12 months. |
| Requirements: Only things I have had to pay for: 18yrs. old - Finger prints $30 U.S. Citizen - Passport $45 (should be free but I did it wrong) - Everything else paid for (plane tickets, medical tests..) What helps: College Degree Extensive Volunteer Experience 2years of college level Spanish or French (Latin America and West Africa areas) Dateline: July- Started application (all approx page lengths, did it online so hard to remember) -15pages (approx) (complete job history and volunteer experience...took about 30hrs to do) - 2 essays - 3 references (they were almost as hard as the application, thank you Megan, Roger and Lee) - 5 page medical questionaire asking about EVERY possible disease you may or will have - Two sets of thumb prints for the FBI background check August- - 2hr interview with recrutier "Why do you want to do this" "How does your family feel" "What would you do in this situation" type questions. Got my acceptance that day at the end of the interview and she said I could leave in August to do a marketing program or leave in July to do a young entrepenuir program. I choose August because I wanted to be here for Emily's birthday. September- October - Medical Packet: Complete physical exam, blood tests, HIV, some other tests I don't remember the names, psycholocial evaluation forms, allergy test and vision test and hearing tests. December - Got legal clearance (which meant that I had no legal issues finacial (home owner stuff) or any issues with the law) March - Got medical clearance - Got my invitation a week after MC and it was sent via fedex. You have an account thingy that gives you updates on your application status and it said the invitation had been sent. So of course everyday after that till it came I would literally run to the front door hoping to see that giant white envelope. The day it finally came it was kinda torn so the big bold letters "GUATEMALA" were exposed (none of that open the envelope excitement) and there it was. Then I opened it and it said sustainable agriculture and I thought "Oh no! I am gonna be a farmer!" but then I read on and it is "Sustainable Agriculture in Marketing". Big difference! - Had 10days to accept, and I did April - Sent my resume and aspiration statement (why am I do doing this and what am I expecting) - Registered for my passport June - Send unofficial transcript to D.C. July - Get staging infomation, airline tickets (where I am going for the 3days before I go to Guatemala to do legal visa stuff and get a lot of shots) August 29th - Off to Miami September 2nd - Off to Guatemala |