HEBRON – Hebron resident Janna Rearick recently returned to the United States following two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Tanzania, East Africa.

Rearick, a Williams College graduate, lived and worked as a biology teacher in an all-girls boarding secondary school surrounded by banana and coffee plantations on the shore of Lake Victoria. Tanzania borders the Indian Ocean between Kenya and Mozambique.

Throughout her service in East Africa, Rearick’s primary duty was teaching advanced biology.

Additional projects included girls’ and women’s empowerment, sports teams, study skills sessions and HIV/AIDS awareness activities.

She also experienced local culture through activities such climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro with 20 students, most of whom had never seen a mountain before.

Rearick graduated from Williams College in June 2002 with a B.S. in biology.

She worked as a laboratory technician at Brandeis University before joining the Peace Corps in 2003.

Rearick cites benefits of service as “an increase in confidence and flexibility.”

After finishing her service in Tanzania in December, Rearick returned to the United States.

She plans on going to law school.

Currently, 167 Peace Corps volunteers are serving in Tanzania, although more than 1,800 men and women have served in the region since the inception of the program in 1962.

Peace Corps volunteers in Tanzania work in primary and secondary schools as well as with out-of-school youth and local residents in the areas of education, environmental protection and health awareness.

For more information about Peace Corps, visit www.peacecorps.gov or call 617-565-5555.

Copy the Story Link