It’s a custom practiced by the Peace Corps around the world: ringing a bell when volunteers conclude their service “in country.”
During the past year, far from concluding their service to Teachers College’s Peace Corps Fellows Program — a master’s degree program that prepares Returned Peace Corps Volunteers to teach in under-resourced New York City public schools — Trustee Emeritus Elliot and Roslyn Jaffe gave the program a $2 million gift. Together with a match from TC, that funding is covering full tuition for cohorts of a dozen or more Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows annually.
Nevertheless, since June, when TC celebrated the 30th anniversary of the Jaffe family’s support for the TC Peace Corps Fellows, a ceremonial bell, given by Jody Olsen, Director of the nation’s Peace Corps program, has hung in Zankel Lobby with a plaque that reads: “This bell, a gift from the Peace Corps to Teachers College, celebrates over 30 years of our mutually rewarding collaboration in promoting peace, education and progress.” In 1985, Olsen was part of a member of the team that created the TC Peace Corps Fellows — the first graduate program in the country to provide scholarships for volunteers returning from Peace Corps service — and the Jaffes have since supported more than 750 Peace Corps Fellows.
“The Jaffe family’s gift of providing superb teachers for our students exemplifies what Teachers College is all about,” said Elaine Perlman (M.A. ’93), Peace Corps Fellows Program Director. “Short of top medical schools, I don’t know other programs that fully fund their entire cohort of students.”
Their latest gift brings the Jaffes’ total support to the College to $5.4 million, with their support for the Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows coming on three levels: via generous “enrichment grants” that enable Fellows to purchase books and classroom supplies, take their students on field trips or initiate projects; the Jaffe Cultural Arts Program, through which the Fellows bring students to performances at Lincoln Center; and the full tuition scholarship support through the Jaffe Fellowships.
Meanwhile, the Jaffes’ daughter-in-law, Helen Jaffe, who joined TC’s Board in 2017, has herself become involved in the Peace Corps Fellows, participating in storytelling workshops during the program’s Intensive Summer Institute, visiting Fellows in their classrooms and — of course — attending the festive annual pizza parties.
“The impact of the Jaffe family has always been enormous, but now, with the ability to recruit Jaffe Fellows who couldn’t otherwise afford tuition, we are increasingly able to draw the best and brightest to TC and New York City classrooms,” Perlman said.
Perhaps no one can better express the value of the program than the Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows themselves — and several of them did just that at the celebration in June.
“Many of the returning Peace Corps veterans come back to the United States with a more nuanced perspective of the world and greater insights into the opportunities afforded by our society,” said Michele St. John-Denerstein (M.A. ’18), who volunteered for the Peace Corps in Ivory Coast and now teaches high school English in the Bronx. “Serving as Jaffe Fellows allows us to communicate that through our lessons.”
Maria Sebastian (M.A. ’18), who volunteered for the Peace Corps in St. Lucia and is now a social studies teacher in Brooklyn, said that “the Peace Corps Fellows Program, much like the Peace Corps, has opened doors to a whole new world for me. These were some of the most difficult yet profound years that have added a light to who I am today.”
David Lennington, who will receive his TC master’s degree in 2021, is a middleschool English teacher on Manhattan’s Lower East Side who served in the Peace Corps in the Federated States of Micronesia. “For many of us, joining the Peace Corps isn’t a two-year commitment — it’s a lifetime commitment of service,” he said. “And nowhere is that clearer than with the Peace Corps Fellows Program. We get to translate our Peace Corps service back home in a tangible way every day, which is a truly awesome opportunity.”
And Marc Skelton (M.A. ’05), a social studies teacher and basketball coach at Fannie Lou Hamer High School in the Bronx (and recent author of Pounding the Rock: Basketball Dreams and Real Life in a Bronx High School, published by Penguin Random House), confided that “becoming a Jaffe Peace Corps Fellow was, for me, a ballast against the chaos of the daunting task of finding out what to do with my life.” Skelton, who served in the Peace Corps in Moldova, added, “I’ve been able to navigate a career in education that I’m proud of.”
The 12 members of the 2020 cohort of Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows will include a record number of first-generation college students and will be known as the Jaffe Dozen. “These Fellows have been selected for their ability to create warm and welcoming classroom communities that will benefit the thousands of students they teach throughout their careers,” says Perlman. “Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows graduate from Teachers College with the preparation, intellect and drive to become educational leaders.”
For their part, members of the Jaffe family are deeply proud of the Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows’ accomplishments. “These bright young people return from the Peace Corps after serving in some of the most challenging places on Earth,” says Elliot Jaffe. “They have been tested, and yet they continue to show their determination to make the world better as great teachers. And what better place is there than a New York City classroom for them to bring more good to the world? We know hundreds of Jaffe Fellows. We get back as much as we put into the program, and more.”