Paul Burnore grew up in South Bend, Indiana and earned degrees in English Literature from Indiana University. He became a Peace Corps Volunteer in Thailand where he taught at Songkhla University. He later taught poetry and literature at Indiana University, Jundi Shapur University in Iran, and Anatolia College in Greece. He joined IBM in 1978 and worked in several management jobs until 1992, when he rejoined the Peace Corps as the first Country Director of Kazakhstan.