The Three Goals of Peace Corps
Peace Corps Merit Badges will always remain committed to the three simple goals of the Peace Corps mission promoting world peace and friendship...


Host Country Improvement
"Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women"
Improving the quality of life of the people in our host countries includes providing resources, opportunities and encouragement to our local community members, especially our friends who create our badges and extras, while also respecting and honoring the uniqueness of each of our host countries


Volunteer Happiness
"Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served"
Improving the quality of life of Peace Corps Volunteers involves reflection, humor, fun and support as we share our stories and experiences with one another, ultimately helping each of us serve as better Volunteers and friends in our local host communities during our service


Sharing Experiences
"Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans"
Achieving the third goal of Peace Corps involves sharing our service experiences with our family, friends, and our fellow American citizens. These merit badges provide not only a fun starting point but also a tangible reminder of our complex and incredible Peace Corps service




Fair Trade Principles
We have designed the Peace Corps Merit Badges project around fair trade principles that we all believe in...
 
 
 
Fair Price

Together with our friends, we decide on a fair price that goes at least one and a half times the minimum wage. We always pay in full at the time of delivery.
 
Fair Time

We choose to make a difference in the lives of dozens rather than thousands so that we can give to people to help them develop their lives and their communities. We are dedicated to helping people to lead balanced lives and to live within their means.
  

 
Fair Work

We work closely with our friends to recognize and avoid child labor, gender inequality and excessive work hours for all and to create safe and friendly working environments.

Fair Growth

We are dedicated to increasing our artisans' access to new markets, locally and globally, developing quality products that give a fair price to customers. No profits are ever taken by the founders of the project and we are dedicated to full transparency and accountability at every level.



    
Fair Care

We work closely with our artisans to apply environmentally responsible methods of production and to use sustainable materials whenever possible.

Fair Future

We encourage others to buy Fair Trade products equally for the quality of product and the motivation of the company for its artisans. At every level possible, this project is managed by Mongolian citizens to ensure sustainability for our artisans and a happy and successful future for the project.

A Brief History


Peace Corps Merit Badges is a service project by Peace Corps Volunteers serving around the world. The founders Travis Hellstrom and Ridge Zackary thought it would be fun to combine the idea of merit badges with the unique and amazing experiences that Peace Corps Volunteers go through during their service. The more they talked about it with their Peace Corps friends the more they thought it was an idea that should finally come to fruition. After months of preparation and review, involving dozens of PCVs, RPCVs, and Peace Corps staff from around the world, the project launched publicly in 2010.



The idea of merit badges is known throughout the world primarily by the long history of the Scouting movement which began with Sir Baden Powell in 1907 and expanded to the United States in 1910. Travis, one of the founders of Peace Corps Merit Badges, also earned the rank of Eagle Scout within the Boy Scouts of America. Merit badges are based on military recognition for skills and honors and have inspired millions of young people around the world for over a century. Our project builds on that momentum to include the Peace Corps experience, which shares many of the values of Scouting: culture, heritage, citizenship in the community, nation and world to name a few. Our badges measure approximately 2 inches, slightly larger than today's Boy Scout merit badges at 1.5 inches. Also our badges, being handmade, resemble some of the earlier merit badges in the first fifty years of Scouting. You can read more about the story and philosophy of Peace Corps Merit Badges below.


An Idea Developed

During mid-service conference, halfway through Peace Corps service, Travis Hellstrom, Ridge Zackary and friends were talking about all of the interesting and difficult things that Peace Corps Volunteers accomplished during their service. Mongolia is a unique country that challenges volunteers to live in a way that is completely different from their lives in the United States and PCVs are proud of these accomplishments though many of them are personal achievements. Wouldn't it be great, we thought, if people could earn a badge like Boy Scouts for doing things in Peace Corps like living in a Mongolian ger. The idea seemed fun and as it spread to other the PCVs their reaction was overwhelmingly positive. People immediately said, "You should do that!" and after our conference we decided to make Peace Corps Merit Badges a reality. Help from other volunteers was quickly enlisted and duties assigned. The idea slowly began to crystallize into a real project devoted not only to sharing Volunteer's personal achievements in a fun way, but into a system to support small business and help out our local communities.

Our Beginning

The project began in Mongolia with three main goals: to support community development and local business, to share experiences as Peace Corps Volunteers (PCVs), and to support Peace Corps' Third Goal: to promote Americans' understanding of our host country. For this reason we decided there would be no offensive badges or anything that could promote negative opinions of any host country, its customs, people, language, the United States or the Peace Corps.

Our Friends

To promote host country development and locally owned small businesses we decided to involve individual embroiderers rather than find machines that could make our badges. We also decided to let them set their own price for the badges. After two months of searching we finally found an older lady named Tseesuren (who we later learned was our Mongolian friend's mother!) who agreed to make a few badges for us. She started with designs and estimates and we spent a few weeks simplifying designs, testing materials and deciding on a fair price. Depending on its difficulty Tseesuren said each badge could take between 1 and 2 hours to make. For this reason, combined with the cost of materials to make each badge, she asked for badges to be set at 2,000 tugricks each or roughly $1.50. This would be the price we charged per badge on our site and then shipping would cost extra, depending on the location.

Our Volunteers

On the Peace Corps side, the intent behind Peace Corps Merit Badges is for PCVs to have fun and display elements of their service and host country to share with other Volunteers, friends and family members. The merit badges represent a wide range of experiences from the kind of home one lives in and where (e.g. Ger Dweller, Sukhbataar Aimag) to accomplishments and activities (e.g. Capacity Building, Making a Difference, One Laptop per Child). We decided early on that all badges would remain positive, upbeat, lighthearted and fun. Our leadership team oversaw the approval of each badge and made sure each one was something we wouldn't mind our host grandma seeing, or the President for that matter. We wanted the badges to be something people would point out and comment on. Each Peace Corps Merit Badge would hold a story you want to share with people.

Our Third Goal

The United States Peace Corps' Third Goal states, "promote helping Americans understand the people and cultures of other countries." Peace Corps Merit Badges strives to generate attention and discussion about our host countries' cultures and our Volunteer service. It is our hope that those involved develop a better understanding of foreign cultures, generate interest in cultures around the world and add, even the tiniest bit, to more world peace and friendship. This simple philosophy drives our direction everyday.

Our Badges

Badges are and will always be created through suggestions by Volunteers submitted to us through our website, Facebook, Twitter, and brainstorming among friends. At all times badge creation and modification will be an open process to ensure the best badge ideas, designs, and descriptions are produced. Our Volunteers are very mindful of the image we are sharing, of our host countries, our government and the Peace Corps community. Each badge is researched and developed by Volunteers around the world before being reviewed and finally approved by our Board of Directors. This is an open process which allows anyone to raise objections and give suggestions for improvement. We believe the open nature of the project will ensure an appropriate level of self-censorship, maintain a positive perspective, and generate the highest quality possible. Once a badge has been finished, reviewed and approved, it is moved to our "Collection" where it can be ordered.

Earning badges is as simple as ordering from our website. While we explored the idea of verification, we decided to trust Volunteer's honesty and appeal to the largest possible market. The PCVs we know are very proud of where they live, the work they do, the communities they serve, and even the size of ger they live in. Peace Corps Merit Badges reflects this by offering a diverse range of badges for sectors such as CED and CYD, Grant Writing, Ger Dwelling, and many more. The wide variety of badges means that each person can collect a set that reflects his or her unique experiences in Peace Corps.

Our Leadership

Our leadership is made up of dedicated Volunteers and continues to grow as we partner with other organizations and expand to other Peace Corps countries and communities. Responsibilities of Board members include: vision, partnerships, promotion, marketing, quality, volunteer interest, online presence, manufacturing, and interaction with other Peace Corps countries. We also have a Review Team made up of current and Returned Peace Corps Volunteers and friends from around the world. They help keep Peace Corps Merit Badges running by providing valuable input, suggestions, experience, outside perspective, and contributing to badge design. Together these two leadership teams have helped created our organization, image, and character.

Official Launch

Beginning our project we spent over two months reviewing badge ideas, designs, and descriptions. We started sharing the project privately with other Volunteers, gradually working our way up to the Peace Corps Country Director for approval and input. Once everything was in place, we officially launched PeaceCorpsMeritBadges.com on November 12th, 2009. Within one week we had received over 300 visits and $100 in donations. Our first orders would come weeks later, as a mix of badge orders and donations (sometimes at the same time). Coupled with the enthusiastic response we received from Volunteers, we got a very good feeling as a team that what we were doing was going to be very well received by our Peace Corps Volunteers and help a lot of people. We expanded the website to include a holiday update, gift certificates for family and friends to sponsor Volunteers, and highlighted ways for visitors to get involved such as designing badges themselves and sharing the site with others. We also opened bank accounts for the project, in Mongolian and American currency, to better facilitate online payments and shared the project in person with our fellow Volunteers over the holidays.

A month after launching we were approached by the National Peace Corps Association to possibly partner with them to create special badges, including a merit badge to celebrate Peace Corps' 50th Anniversary in 2011. "Scaling up" our operation, as NPCA suggested, wasn't something we were sure we could do since we had originally only planned to provide badges to Peace Corps Mongolia Volunteers, but after talking with Tseesuren and our Board of Directors everyone decided we should give it a shot. Tseesuren said, in fact, that she would love to bring in more people from the community to help out and thought it could be a very good opportunity for her family, friends and neighbors. With the support of our local community and friends around the world we have decided to provide Peace Corps Merit Badges worldwide. We are excited, with your help, to write this next chapter in our story...