Ken Gulick, MA ’98 (international studies), MBA ’98 (general business)

Peace Corps location: Fiji

Current location: Luxembourg

Current position: Commercial Director, Pan European Pensions at Fidelity International

I had a huge desire to explore, to see parts of the world that I hadn’t before, and to give back to the community while doing it. So when given the chance to serve in Fiji for two years, I took it. I could not imagine the things I would learn or the gratitude I would receive.

I was asked to be the principal for a summer school program where 30 Corps members taught over 200 local students for two weeks. We helped give students a boost in their math, physics, biology, and chemistry studies and they were so appreciative of the opportunity to learn. It made the effort highly rewarding.

Plus, so much of your environment in the Peace Corps is new and uncharted territory that you have to be able to adapt to and in order to be effective at adapting, you have to listen and be able to ‘read the room.’ The Corps taught me how to do that and those skills have served me well when I attended the UO for grad school, throughout my career, and when applied to my personal life because now I can adapt to constantly evolving environments.