Generosity has a way of reaching farther than we can see in the moment. 

Long before I understood the full power of international exchange, someone else’s generosity helped open the world to me. It began not with a passport or a plane ticket, but with a shy thirteen-year-old, a box of candy bars, and the courage to ask others to believe in a possibility I could not yet fully see. 

At thirteen, growing up in Michigan, my world was rooted in the familiar rhythms of family, school, my neighborhood, and basketball. I had not yet traveled beyond North America, and I could not have imagined how one unexpected opportunity would begin to change the way I saw myself and the world. 

Then I was selected for a basketball team traveling to Sweden for a month of competition and cultural exchange. It was an incredible opportunity, but it came with a cost my family could not easily absorb. 

As part of the team’s fundraising effort, we were given boxes of one-dollar candy bars to sell. So I took my box and started knocking on doors. 

I was painfully shy. Every knock came with anxiety. Would someone answer? Would they say no? Would they wonder why I was bothering them? 

I did not have the language for it then, but I was beginning to practice some of the leadership skills that shape us as people: the courage to ask someone else to believe in a possibility they could not yet fully see. 

I sold candy bars, delivered my paper route, and watched my parents contribute what they could. Piece by piece, dollar by dollar, enough people believed in that opportunity for me to go. 

Looking back, those small acts of support were never really about the candy. 

I still remember stepping into a gym in another country and realizing that a game I knew so well could connect me to people whose lives were so different from mine. That month in Sweden changed me in ways I could not have understood then. I met people who spoke different languages, lived differently, and saw the world through entirely different lenses. I came home with more confidence, more curiosity, and a new sense of possibility. 

Most importantly, I came home believing the world was far bigger than I had imagined—and that there was a place for me in it. 

More than thirty-five years later, I have had the privilege of spending my career helping create similar opportunities for others. Together with colleagues, partners, and supporters, Cultural Vistas has helped well over 160,000 people study, work, serve, and lead across cultures. Every journey began because someone believed investing in people creates lasting returns. 

Over the years, I have come to understand that exchange does not end when participants board a plane home. In many ways, that is when their next chapter begins. People build careers, become leaders, launch businesses, create innovations, serve their communities, and keep learning and growing from the networks and relationships they’ve built for years—even decades. 

I see this ripple effect in participants in programs such as Cultural Horizons, our Shared Service, Shared Healing program with Vietnam veterans, and the Atlas Corps Leadership Institute. Each reflects a different expression of the same belief: an exchange does not end with a single journey. Its impact continues through the relationships, leadership, and opportunities people carry forward. 

Cultural Horizons helps Ukrainian artists and cultural professionals rebuild connections and strengthen their work during a time of war. The Vietnam Veterans Exchange Program creates space for veterans from former opposing sides to find understanding and common ground through shared experience. The Atlas Corps Leadership Institute equips emerging leaders to grow their skills, strengthen their networks, and bring new ideas back to their communities. 

Even now, asking for support is not the easiest part of my work. It asks me to do something I first learned as a shy thirteen-year-old: invite someone else to believe in a possibility they cannot yet fully see. 

The people who supported me were not investing in certainty. They had no idea where my life would lead. They were simply giving a young person the chance to experience something extraordinary. 

 Someone’s gift once helped send me into the world, and the payoff has lasted a lifetime. 

When you support Cultural Vistas, you are doing much the same thing. You are investing in a young person discovering another culture for the first time, a leader growing through a global network of peers, an artist rebuilding professional connections, or a veteran finding common ground through shared experience. 

Today, I am asking those who believe in this work to consider making a meaningful investment in what becomes possible when people are given the chance to see the world through a wider lens.

In November, we will be bringing together partners, alumni, and friends in New York not only to gather in community, but to support what becomes possible when people are given the chance to encounter the world, and one another, differently. 

I hope you will join us in New York and in this work by helping carry that belief forward.