PTIP Reports

Posted by Jeremiah Marquis on 09/05/2007

The major accomplishment of this week was going into the capital and talking with my boss about all my accomplishments in a thing we like to call PTIPs. What are PTIPs? Well, the acronym, which I have grown to think of as a term paper every four months, is our review that we fill out and take to our boss to talk over. We show up and sit down in his office and have time to go over the forms to see how we are doing, where we see ourselves going etc. etc. I could not for the life of me tell you what PTIP stands for but I know it's something about progress...or planning...or "pretty time in Paraguay" might be what it stands for, though I wouldn't bet on it.

All I know is it takes a long time to sit down and go over all the things that you have done for the past four months and then write about what you plan to do for the next four months and THEN get folks in your community to fill out the back half with our progress so far and what we plan to do together in the next four months. It is time consuming to complete all that paperwork and then take it out of your site on an eight hour bus ride to hand deliver to your boss who has a sit down meeting with you and then returns the paperwork back to you with comments. But it a necessary process, as it really helps to write it down and see where you are taking things and then to get the chance of some outside help.

That's great and everything but the real benefit is to get into a town with real theaters, bars and restaurants and have fun with your Volunteer friends. It can be extremely exhausting to be out in site and going through the daily grind with no relief. You sometimes need that opportunity to get in, speak English the whole time and enjoy the cushy TV with a REMOTE...I mean can life get better? It isn't so much that you don't enjoy your site or that you are tired of your life. It's just that a change is needed sometimes and getting out there and enjoying some friends is a good way to change it up.

With the combined "review and relief" time one could easily argue that PTIP works on two different levels for a lot of people. First, it offers the opportunity for you to get focused on what you have been doing and what you mean to be doing for the next few months. Second, it provides you the chance to breathe a bit so that you can get back in there with new enthusiasm and spirits to go and accomplish what you wrote down in the first place. I, for one, am glad I had the opportunity to put everything in perspective and then party 'til I wanted to actually do those things...it's a win win!

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This webpage expresses the views of Jeremiah Marquis. It does not express the views of the United States Peace Corps.

Last updated Sep 29 2008