Kaela Frank

M.A. Peace Education – United Nations mandated University for Peace
B.A. Interdisciplinary Studies: Peace and Conflict – Davidson College

Kaela is ultimately motivated by a desire to transform conflicts and build peace at intra- and inter-personal levels. This desire originated through experiences studying in Israel and India, where she interacted with people who held different worldviews and lived competing truths. Kaela started to work in intercultural peace-building as a camp counselor and intern for Seeds of Peace and later as a fellow for Interfaith Youth Core.

Following her studies, Kaela spent four years working with the Dean Rusk International Studies Program at Davidson College, advising students on study abroad options and managing a portfolio of 10 study abroad programs. She also worked for one year as an Assistant Director for Experiential Learning at the Florida State University Career Center. Kaela loves connecting students with opportunities for research, internships, and study abroad, but she prefers to be a direct facilitator of experiential learning.

As a college student, Kaela led backpacking and canoeing expeditions for her peers, facilitated high and low ropes course initiatives, taught a course in wilderness leadership skills, and became certified as a Wilderness First Responder. After college, Kaela interned with the North Carolina Outward Bound School and has since worked as Residential and Expeditionary Faculty at the Outdoor Academy in North Carolina and at the Alzar School in Idaho and Chile.

Kaela is excited to help others develop their personal awareness, cultural understanding, and leadership potential through unfamiliar experiences in the wilderness and abroad. She guides her students to reflect critically and act purposefully from their experiences. While Kaela grew up on the coast of southern Maine, her heart is in the Blue Ridge mountains and her belongings are still in Idaho. Kaela uses spices liberally in her cooking, trades haircuts for other skills/goods, and is a certified hatha yoga instructor.