UD's Spritz to serve Peace Corps in Rwanda

2016 Jun 1

Wilmington's Bridgette Spritz has been selected as a Peace Corps volunteer and will head off to Rwanda this September.

For Spritz, an international relations major, the opportunity to teach English in the East African nation is the realization of a dream she's had for years. "I heard about Peace Corps in high school through one of my teachers," she said. "He spoke about the organization with such respect."

According to Spritz, it was two study abroad programs - freshman year to Morocco and later to Malaysia and Vietnam - with Audrey Helfman of the School of Public Policy and Administration that gave her the "confidence and curiosity" to take a leap of faith and apply to the program.

"I feel like I've really benefited," said Spritz, who is minoring in Islamic studies, Arabic language, and organizational and community leadership. "Those experiences abroad have changed my perspective on what people's lives are like and what their needs are."

Once in Rwanda, Spritz will not only learn Kinyarwanda, one of the country's three official languages, but expects that she will also pick up a working knowledge of French.

Spritz was selected to the Peace Corps along with John McCarron, a Downingtown, Pa. native who left for Ghana after graduation.

During the application process, Spritz allowed the Peace Corps program to choose her location of service. "I figured that they've done this before and I should trust the process."

While she had never previously considered traveling to Rwanda, Spritz eagerly anticipates digging deeper into the country known predominantly by Americans for its 1994 genocide. "I'm really interested in learning more about Rwanda, in getting beyond that one dominant narrative of the country."

What is more, Spritz, a former resident assistant (RA), expects that finding her own place within a Rwandan community will be particularly rewarding. "At the University of Delaware, because it is a middle-sized school, you have to find your space, where you fit in, your group and your formative role in it," said Spritz. "I want to do the same thing in Rwanda, find my community and find my space."