>> Well, just a little bit about, about me.
I'm from Boulder, Colorado.
My father was a university professor.
My mom is a community activist
so that definitely kind
of shaped me as I was growing up.
I love the mountains but I couldn't
wait to escape to sunny California
after graduating from high school.
I went to the University of Southern California.
I studied sociology and while I was
there I studied abroad in Australia
and that just completely transformed my life
and led me to pursuing a Master's Degree
in College Student Personnel
so I came to the University
of Maryland to do that, excellent program.
And while I was here at Maryland
I also had an opportunity
to study abroad but this time I went to Brazil.
It's the first time I'd been to South America.
The first time I'd been to, you know, a part
of the world that was a lot different from,
you know, what I'd been accustomed to before
and I just completely fell in love with it.
So then after I graduated from Maryland I knew
that I wanted to go back to South America.
I decided to go to a Spanish-speaking country
because I wanted to learn another language
and I had started Spanish so
I wanted to continue with that
and I found a teaching position
in Venezuela, Caracas,
so I just applied and got on a plane, landed.
It was culture shock, major!
Not a lot of people speak English in Caracas
and so I had to learn very quickly and then I,
I got, took a job at the University of Tennessee
in Knoxville in the Study Abroad Office.
I was there for five years then
came back to the D.C. area,
worked for my professional association, which is
NAFSA: Association of International Educators,
did project management for them for three years.
Then I moved on to a non-profit, still in D.C.
and we had a contract with the State Department.
Did that for a few years and now I'm here.