Biography
Brings over 25 years of professional experience in international education and programming to her role at American Voices. Following a well-travelled upbringing, she studied abroad in Sweden and London before earning her undergraduate degree at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. She first traveled to India in 1993 with the prestigious Rotary Foundation Fellowship, where she began her studies in Indian classical music and dance. She went on to complete her graduate work in Ethnomusicology, achieving an Award of Merit, at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London. Maria worked as a consultant for Columbia University building an on-line bibliographic database for South Asian studies. In 2000 she began developing and directing university undergraduate study abroad programs. Before joining American Voices, she worked for the Institute for the International Education of Students (IES Abroad), which is headquartered in Chicago and represents a consortium of more than 250 top-tier U.S. colleges and universities. She served as the Director of the IES Delhi Center in India and IES Nice Center in France. Maria is currently based in Bangkok, Thailand, where she is also an active member of the tango dancing community.
