From Honors to the Peace Corps
Alea Denney | Honors College Alumnus
6 Minute Read
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My name is Alea Denney. I am a 2024 graduate of UW's School of Politics, Public Affairs, and International Studies and the Honors College. I am currently serving as a Peace Corps education volunteer in the Dominican Republic, where I tutor 1st through 3rd graders on how to read- entirely in Spanish! I also co-teach local English classes, do virtual lessons for schools in the United States, help run youth summer camps, and get the opportunity to work as a translator for various medical missions throughout the Dominican Republic. I recently reached the halfway point of my service - one year down! - and will be working on some of my final projects.
My time in the UW Honors College was hugely influential in helping me reach this dream aspiration fresh out of college, especially the work I did for my Capstone project. During college, for this cumulative project, I examined similarities and differences between museums and monuments in the United States and Vietnam for how they portray the war between our (now) two nations in the 1970s. The Honors approach, stressing the inclusion of multidisciplinary perspectives, helped me ensure my work was well-rounded and captured a broad range of views and impacts.
This project, in particular, was important for keeping me more aware of cultural sensitivities and helping me to be more critical of bias in historical sources. These two factors are extremely important for me today as I now live in a nation that was fairly recently under the rule of a dictator, and a nation that also committed great violence against our neighbors in Haiti, yet has a massive Haitian/Haitian descent population still within our borders. Staying aware of cultural sensitivities and tensions between Dominicans and Haitians between each other and with their own histories, helps me to avoid making social faux pas and keeps me alert to situations where individuals may be discriminated against or lack adequate support. These examples, amongst many, and the values of being a global citizen supported by the Honors College, have helped me to fruitfully begin my international career.
