We have been brainstorming the next steps after the TODOS Educate, Speak & Act Forum, and after checking in with our community, Barcelona SAE is proud to announce the creation of the TODOS Sounding Board.
The mission of the sounding board is to provide professional development in the area of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and a space to share collective challenges and solutions around D/E/I across the field of international education.
The Sounding Board will be focused on the 3 Do’s (Discussion, Direction, and Development). The collective knowledge that is collected will then be broken down into actionable goals to be implemented within Barcelona SAE and shared with the greater community.
You can view the full TODOS Sounding Board Webinar Series & Community Discussion schedule here.
MEET THE TODOS SOUNDING BOARD MEMBERS
Olivia Ellis
Olivia is an Education Abroad Advisor and Scholarships Coordinator at the University of Kentucky. Born and raised in Eastern Kentucky, Olivia hails from Van Lear – a small coal-mining town in Appalachia. Her passion for all things international started there as a bright eyed kid with teachers willing to support her. She attended Transylvania University for her B.A. in International Affairs and German Studies, where she studied abroad in Munich, Germany. She continued her education at the University of Kentucky with her M.A. in Diplomacy and International Commerce with a focus in Transnational Organizations and Development. Olivia has served in the field for six years and has held a variety of positions in the UK office. In her roles, Olivia has found joy in helping students and their families navigate the education abroad experience. The world may seem too big for many people to take on alone, so she works to make it accessible and manageable for students and families.
Kate Meyer
Katherine Mary "Kate" Meyer (she/they) has worked in international education as an EFL instructor and various roles within education abroad at land grant and private institutions. Through experiences as a first-generation college student from a rural, "free lunch club" background, it has become her career mission to aid similar students and others from underserved populations in exploring the opportunity of taking their academics global- both at home and abroad. She believes that education and, more specifically, transformative education experiences such as study away/abroad are the key to building up students and creating in them a future generation that can face our most striking global challenges. Kate studied and interned in Tokyo, Japan, and ended up back in Japan teaching on the Japan Exchange & Teachers Program (JET). After nearly five years, she returned to the US and obtained her Master's in cross-cultural communication and higher education policy at the University of Minnesota, where she worked in the financial aid office. She will be the first to receive a doctorate in her family, being "ABD" as of summer 2022 at Hamline University.
Andre' Stevenson
Andre' P. Stevenson is Director of the Office of International Programs (OIP) and Professor of Social Work at Elizabeth City State University. As director of OIP, he consistently assists students with being awarded the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship to study abroad. In addition, the OIP developed partnerships with various organizations through which students study abroad. He was selected as a Fulbright-Hays Scholar in 2020 to study in Taiwan. In addition, he was selected as a Council of American Overseas Research Centers Fellow to study in Myanmar. He is active in NCAIE for which he serves as a Board Member. He was selected as member of the inaugural Gilman Scholarship Advisor Ambassadors Program. His current research involves, among other things, scholarly work related to study abroad among HBCUs. He holds a PhD in Social Work Research, Master of Public Health, and Master of Social Work from the University of Pittsburgh. He also holds a Bachelor of Science from South Carolina State University.
Robin Stewart
Robin joined the NC State Study Abroad Office in November 2021. As a Study Abroad Advisor, Robin advises undergraduate students for the College of Humanities and Social Science & the College of Education. She also coordinates pre-departure and re-entry programming for NC State students in addition to managing partnerships with the United Kingdom and Central Europe. Robin holds a M.Ed. in Higher Education Leadership from The Citadel Military College and a B.S. in Management & Information Systems from Tulane University. Prior to joining the Pack, Robin worked in the Center for Academic Performance & Persistence at the College of Charleston. Originally from Charleston, SC, Robin has studied abroad as an undergraduate in Poland through the Department of Jewish Studies and participated in short-term programs in El Salvador and Puerto Rico. Robin also completed a summer study abroad program as a graduate student in the United Kingdom.
Marlee Stein
Bio coming soon!
Adrienne Theune
Adrienne Theune (she/her/hers) is a Study Abroad Coordinator at the University of Central Florida. The roots of her passion for travel, started with homeland visits to Thailand where she was adopted from. Her eagerness to explore the world continued at Colorado State University where Adrienne studied Global Tourism and abroad for a semester in Mallorca, Spain. After university, she worked as an operations assistant for a US travel company in Costa Rica. When the pandemic hit, she found herself back in the higher education space and completed a MS in Global Higher Education at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. Adrienne is driven to expand holistic programming to support marginalized students in addition to helping students better explore and understand their identities while abroad.
