Hello there!
My name is Erin Cowen. I am serving in Togo, Africa as a Health Extension Volunteer for the Peace Corps from June 2023 - September 2025. If you know me and want to keep up with what I am doing, or if you don’t know me and want to learn about a stranger on the internet, go ahead and subscribe.
Here is some basic background information that will be helpful to know before reading my posts:
My role is focused on health education (teaching about maternal and newborn health, vaccinations, disease transmission, etc)
The first three months (June - August 2023) will be spent in Pre-Service Training (PST) in the Central Region
During PST, I will sometimes go to live with a host family in a local village
After PST, I will go to a permanent site for 2 years where I will conduct my service
The Peace Corps is not part of the military
Togo is a French-speaking country with over 30 local languages
Yes, I did take 5 years of French in school
No, I am not fluent
I will be learning French and Kotocoli
I graduated from The Ohio State University in May 2023 with a BS in Biomedical engineering and minors in Business and Computer Information Science
I plan on applying for medical school in the summer of 2025, while I am still in Togo and interviewing once I get back to the US
I am not sure how often I will be able to post, but I hope to share some of my thoughts, experiences, and learnings throughout this chapter of my life. Follow along if you’d like!
Disclaimer: this blog does not represent the beliefs and attitudes of the Peace Corps or the US government. This is just my experience and it is a small glance at the big picture.
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