Summary

In May 1990 (see GAO/NSIAD-90-122), GAO reported that only about seven percent of Peace Corps volunteers were minorities and that recruiters had neither the incentives nor the tools to achieve minority recruitment goals. Minority representation among volunteers increased to about 12 percent by July 1991; however, the Peace Corps has not developed demographic and market data to help set realistic area office recruiting goals and to help recruiters locate qualified minorities. Also, recruiters' performance was still evaluated mainly on the basis of the number of volunteers recruited. Performance evaluations did not adequately consider factors like conducting minority outreach activities that may lead to greater minority recruitment. Minority representation among Peace Corps staff has changed very little, a situation Peace Corps officials attribute to the low number of minorities among returned volunteers, historically the source of most staff employees. Since the completion of this report, the Peace Corps has taken several steps to address the issues raised by GAO.

GAO found that: (1) the Peace Corps' strong commitment to improving its minority profile has increased minority representation among volunteers from about 7 percent in May 1990 to about 12 percent in July 1991; (2) the Peace Corps has undertaken a number of initiatives to improve minority representation among volunteers, including nationwide and area office minority recruitment goals, targeted recruitment at predominantly minority colleges and universities, and educational programs aimed at increasing awareness of the Peace Corps; (3) the Peace Corps has not developed demographic and market data to assist in setting realistic area office recruiting goals and identifying where qualified minorities are located or trained its managers on how to gather such data and use it to develop a comprehensive, strategic approach to minority recruitment; (4) the Peace Corps provides volunteers with cross-cultural training and racial and ethnic training to enhance their awareness of the diversity of ethnic groups; (5) minority representation among Peace Corps staff has slowly increased in such targeted job categories as area office managers, recruiters, and country directors, mainly because of the low number of minorities among returned volunteers, which is the source of most staff employees; and (6) to help achieve minority recruitment goals, the Peace Corps established a task force of area managers to revise recruiters' performance standards and awarded a contract to assist with the development of demographic information.