Advisors
Brian Olson
This is Brian’s sixth year of sponsoring Baxter International, and he is overwhelmed with excitement about the project’s growth, and his ability to live vicariously through his adventurous students. When not organizing student travel opportunities, Brian volunteers for social justice centers and fosters non-profit initiatives around diversity, cultural immersion and understanding. He has taught in the Caribbean, Thailand, & Central America. Brian has more freckles than passport stamps - but just barely.
Megan Lawrence
Brings her enthusiasm for personal growth through exploration of cultures, languages, geography, and people to this vibrant team of explorers. Her background in volunteerism with youth on both sides of a cultural exchange, investment in serving others both at home and abroad, and her deep commitment to language learning fuel her support for the individuals in Baxter International as well as their personal missions for greater understanding of global citizenship.
Nick Caruso
Nick traveled to Seville, Spain to study bilingualism last year with Baxter International, and will use the skills he learned to serve as the project’s student leader this year. In addition to logistical tasks like planning events and fundraising, Nick hopes to serve as a mentor to his fellow students and inspire them through travel.
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Members
Annika Smart
Annika has been a part of Baxter International for two years. She has gone to Cusco, Peru for Spanish language immersion, and she went to Salento, Colombia to work on a sustainable family coffee farm. This past school year, Annika took a year away from school to travel with her family. She visited her former host family in Peru, her former exchange student in Chile, and developed many other cross-cultural connections and friendships.
She was also able to keep a blog with her family which is linked here:
Lily Callow
This is Lily’s first year in Baxter International. Lily has always been intrigued by travel, as she has cousins that travel abroad frequently. Her sister also lived in St. Kitts and Lily visited and got to experience what living in a developing country is like. With that background knowledge of going to another developing country, she can expect the basics of the country’s lifestyle. She also has high hopes to travel in her college career, so experiencing travel now will help her learn if this is a true desire of hers. This year, Lily will be traveling to Bali, Indonesia to build schools for young children in late July-August. She is thrilled to help marginalized families with affordable schooling and create a safe, healthy space for young Indonesians.
Ella Fontaine
Ella Fontaine will be working with Baxter International this year to prepare for her trip abroad to New Zealand. There, she will study during the Spring Semester at a local high school and live with family friends. She hasn’t had the chance to travel internationally yet, so she is excited to be able to experience what life is like outside of the US.
Jonah Tafuri
Jonah will be travelling to Seville, Spain for four weeks with a host family while studying the Spanish language and culture. Jonah decided to join Baxter International because he would like to form a unique experience for himself from Flex Friday before he graduates.
Andrew Suleiman
Andrew is a sophomore student who is joining Baxter International for the first time. He joined the project because of his interest in geography, and is currently trying to join a volunteer program for environmental work in Canada.
Carrie Beecher
Carrie loves travel, and wants to travel more. She has been to Philadelphia, New York City, and Boston, which are all great American cities, but she wants to explore the world outside of her region. She hopes to go somewhere in Europe, maybe even South America or New Zealand, on her Baxter International trip.
Sam Benson
Sam joined Baxter International this year because of his passion for travel. He thought this project would be a perfect way to organize his ideas and dreams into real life experiences. Sam’s biggest trip so far has been to Costa Rica, and this year he would like to go somewhere undeveloped to work with different animals and cultures in a service program format.
Willow Bridgford
Willow is a freshman and joined Baxter International this year. She has traveled before with her family and loves it. In the future she hopes to travel to Greece, but this year will be focusing on learning about the international food offered in the local area.
Chloe Fisher
In her first year with Baxter International, Chloe is pursuing an exchange program in Belgium where she will be living with a host family. She will return in the summer with her host sister who will be staying with her own family for three weeks. Through this experience, Chloe hopes to further globalize her perspective and improve her French.
Leyli Johnson
Leyli is a Senior at Baxter and joined this project in order to plan her gap year before attending college. She is planning on spending time in Spain and Honduras, and hopes to gain lots of experience in the travel field along the way.
Ahlyisen Kearns
Ahlyisen is a Sophomore at Baxter. He joined the project because he has an interest for photojournalism and cultural immersion. He is excited to be able to use his skills in the field of photography around the world as he travels this year with Baxter International.
Nadia McElroy
Nadia joined Baxter International this year in hopes of traveling to get a sense of different lifestyles and cultures. Nadia will be traveling to the Dominican Republic this summer to volunteer at a summer camp.
Tula Fields
Tula is a Sophomore at Baxter, and joined the project this year because of her love of travel. For her project she will be traveling to Madrid to make a small documentary series about Spanish rap and hip-hop.
