Meet the trip leaders

2009 Costa Rica E leaders: Nick Monier and Rebecca Hayes

REBECCA HAYES: Tufts University, B.A., Spanish. While at Tufts, Rebecca choreographed for the Tufts Dance Collective, managed a student-run coffee shop, and volunteered with local immigrant advocacy organizations. During her junior year she took a semester off to teach English in Costa Rica and backpacked in Nicaragua and Guatemala. She returned to Central America twice during her senior year and returned to South America after graduation for further travel and volunteer work. Rebecca recently returned to Cambridge, MA, after spending a year in Southeast Asia and South America. She spent her most formative summers teaching canoeing at YMCA Camp Al-Gon-Quian in northern Michigan. She is fluent in Spanish.

NICK MONIER: Middlebury College, B.A. cum laude, International Politics and Economics. While at Middlebury, Nick skied, enjoyed running on the local trails, and was a member of the Student Government Association, Volunteer Service Organization, and various intramural sports teams. Nick spent the fall semester of his junior year studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina, taking economics, history, and political science classes in Spanish at the Universidad del Salvador. Since graduating from Middlebury, Nick moved to New York City where he teaches 4th grade Special Education in an inclusion classroom in the Bronx as a Teach for America corps member. He also currently attends Pace University, where he is working on his Masters in Elementary Special Education. Nick is a Putney Student Travel alumnus. During high school he participated in a Putney Community Service program in Tanzania. He speaks Spanish fluently.