𝗖𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗯𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝟭𝟴𝘁𝗵 𝗔𝗻𝗻𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗮𝗿𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝟰𝗣𝘀! 𝐄𝐦𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝟒𝐏𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐡, 𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐟𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞

Testimony by Sydny Rose Field

CSO Partner- US Peace Corps Volunteer

PAVIA, Iloilo (- Change is not linear. Change is circular connecting all parts of our lives. We move through life spiraling from the center outward, constantly revisiting the past, present, and future. We carry time in our bodies, our past emotions and imagined futures existing within us now.

Stories of change are stories of our histories and our dreams. We feel, throughout our bodies, the presence of loved ones who have passed and the children we hope to raise. It is the work of archiving our lives and cultures while envisioning our futures together.

I am Sydny Rose Field a Peace Corps Volunteer working with the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) in Pavia, Iloilo. The Peace Corps, established in 1961, is an independent U.S. government agency that partners with communities around the world by sending trained American volunteers to support locally-led development.

The Peace Corps first came to the Philippines in October 1961, making it one of the agency’s oldest programs. I began my service with ten weeks of training in Orani, Bataan studying Filipino, working with youth, and beginning to understand what it means to be a 4Ps youth in the Philippines. Since September 2025, I have been at my permanent site in Pavia, Iloilo. I am an American learning from Filipino youth every day learning what it means to experience change here.

My role within 4Ps is shaped by my coworkers, the youth, and the parents. My work is to listen, to hold space, and to move alongside the needs, goals, and dreams of the community. As identified by my coworkers, my role centers on the youth of Pavia: supporting their needs, facilitating Youth Development Sessions, collaborating across the LGU, and building lasting relationships. Across the country, other Peace Corps Volunteers serve in 4Ps offices in ways that look entirely different because each role is defined by the dreams of its community.

I once attended an art exhibit in Bacolod entitled Panahon Panahon by Frelan Gonzaga. Panahon meaning both weather and time speaks to how we are always in flux, shaped by our environments, yet continuing moving, stretching, growing. Change is not a single moment, but an ongoing state of becoming. After that exhibit, I began thinking about how youth here move through seasons through floods and earthquakes, through forces beyond their control.

In my experience, 4Ps holds the potential to create space for those who have not always been given one. It gathers people together and offers them the chance to build skills, confidence, and possibility. It can open pathways toward independence, autonomy, and the ability to dream and I believe this ability to dream is the most important. Dreaming allows us to imagine futures beyond our current realities; beyond the ways we are often defined. When I speak with families, they often begin by saying they are poor. But with space, other identities emerge: singers, dancers, artists, athletes, people who dream. Often, families place these dreams within their children, hoping they will reach opportunities they themselves did not have. The youth carry the weight of both hope and change. And so, 4Ps must continue to invest in them to support not only their needs, but their visions of change.

When I think of change, I think of the youth of Pavia who speak about their families and the shifts they have lived through seasons of typhoons, illness, death, and life. I also think of their creativity, of how quickly a pen and paper becomes a way to express what they carry. They are artists, and their work reflects these seasons, the experiences of their families and their hopes for the future. In moments of change, art becomes a window into their inner worlds which hold so many seasons. Through it, they share their stories – the stories of change. (Submitted by Pavia MOO, Iloilo POO)