DE PERE — Michael McMorrow has waited years for this moment.
After the pandemic forced over 7,000 Peace Corps volunteers to return home, McMorrow will finally get his chance to go abroad. This is something he said he's been looking forward to for years.
"That patience and having to wait a little bit longer just makes it that more exciting," said McMorrow.
McMorrow grew up looking over his globe imagining the places he'd one day get to travel to experience new cultures and met new people.
Now, he'll be living entirely across the globe from his hometown. He plans to be a part of the Peace Corps efforts in Uganda for the next 27 months. He is slated to work as part of the early childhood literacy project in the country.
"With English being the global language of commerce and academia, they're really looking to improve those skills, especially in younger children," said McMorrow.
McMorrow, a University of Wisconsin Madison graduate, continues a long line of legacy from school in the Peace Corps.
David Abundis is the Peace Corps recruiter in charge of Wisconsin and the upper peninsula of Michigan. He said that the school has a strong pipeline of volunteers.
"U.W. Madison has been the school that has produced the most volunteers from 2017 through 2020," said Abundis.
Statewide, Abundis said in the history of the Peace Corps, there have been around 6,400 volunteers from the state of Wisconsin.
Abundis says the main mission of the Peace Corps is to promote world peace and friendship. They do this through three different goals.
"The first one is to help people of interested countries and meet their need for trained men and women, the second one is to promote a better understanding of Americans, and then the third goal is to help promote a better understanding of other people," said Abundis.
