One Year Later: We haven't gotten very far

To all members of the Peace Corps Community,

One year ago, four NPCA staff members submitted a Complaint of Gender Discrimination and Request for Remedial Measures to the NPCA Board of Directors.

One year later, the NPCA Board has not contacted RPCV Allies, nor the signers of the complaint formally after they left NPCA.

We were hopeful when we found out Glenn Blumhorst, former CEO, left in June 2022. We were also hopeful when the NPCA Board of Directors took steps to form various committees and offer listening sessions to the community. However, the actions in the past several weeks have eroded that hope.

We are concerned that NPCA still directly and indirectly upholds and perpetuates an unsafe and hostile work and community environment against women. Dan Baker, former NPCA Director of Programs 2020-2022 (and former NPCA Board Member 2019-2020), was directly named in the 2021 complaint and was recently promoted to interim CEO with no explanation from the board on the decision. Dan upheld and perpetuated the hostile workplace that staff experienced and is now rewarded by promotion. We were extremely disappointed to see several NPCA members upset by Glenn’s departure, including through racist and sexist comments, with no comment from NPCA.

Since the departure of former NPCA CEO Glenn Blumhorst, NPCA launched a new CEO search. NPCA committed to hosting community listening sessions for the search, but to date only NPCA Affiliate groups have been invited to participate, and they were informed in an email only two days before a session happened on a weekend. NPCA did not post information about the session on social media, in its regular newsletter, nor make it accessible on its website. An announcement about the session was published at Peace Corps Worldwide, but the website has a limited audience and is not an NPCA communications platform. NPCA has not made evident any plan to hold further sessions.

These events do not instill confidence that NPCA is taking change seriously. We still see a lack of accountability and hypocrisy between what NPCA says it stands for and what it does.

The NPCA Board should hear from everyone in the Peace Corps Community. Please let us know in our survey (Survey Monkey) what you would like to see in a new CEO and the direction you would like to see NPCA go. Answers will be compiled and shared anonymously with the NPCA board.

If there are concerns or comments you would like to share, please use our Anonymous Support form or email rpcvallies@gmail.com.

You can also contact the board directly.