<p>Hello there! I&#39;m Layne. I was raised in Nebraska and am currently studying International Relations at University of San Diego. I enjoy learning, laughing, dancing, reading, connecting with people, and being outside. I think life is pretty amazing and I enjoy capturing it on camera.</p>

<p>Meet Julian Barajas, a lovable ball of fun who&#39;s from Arlington, VA. When he&#39;s not trying to make it look like he knows how to play basketball, soccer, or other cool sport you think is cool, he&#39;s listening to music from his favorite artists such as NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, LFO, Jesse McCartney, Usher, early Chris Brown or pretty much anything else. He attends Bowdoin College where he studies Government and hosts a radio show, mentors hilarious kids, and explores the outdoors with the outing club. If you want to learn more about his wacky adventures and what kind of person he is, check out his blog where he posts rhymes, raps, poetry, and stories.</p>

I'm a rising junior at Williams College majoring in English and political science. I love reading and running, Jane Austen and J.K. Rowling, pumpkin bread and pretzels, The Grapes of Wrath and green tea. I'm spending a semester in Ireland to study Irish literature and to work on my own writing.

<p>Hi, I&#39;m Alex. I&#39;m a junior at Columbia University majoring in Urban Studies and dabbling in other areas of interest like race &amp; ethnicity studies. Outside of school, I like to eat, cook, take pictures, shop, have long conversations, and travel. Food, fashion, culture, literature, and music are all things I love. Black and gold are my favorite colors. Having lived in New York City for two years now, I feel quite at home. However, living in Japan is something I have wanted to do all my life, so I&#39;m quite excited to finally live out that dream. From the local culture to the food to the fashion, I&#39;m pumped to engage with it all during my semester abroad.</p>

<p>Ruth Marie Landry is a junior majoring in the Writing Seminars at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD. On campus, she works in the library and as a tutor for high school students. She is also a DJ for WJHU (Johns Hopkins&#39; only student radio station) and the co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of Vector Magazine, an online literary magazine. While growing up in New Orleans, she developed a love for spicy food, dancing to live music, and long, poorly planned road trips. Ruth enjoys big cities, Sphynx cats and Brutalist architecture.</p>

<p>I&#39;m Oonagh (ooh-nah), a junior at Grinnell College, and a Political Science major who fancies herself an occasional artist and a lifelong doodler. I&#39;m very excited and mildly terrified to start my stay in Quito, but I&#39;m very much looking forward to immersing myself in the language and culture.</p>

<p>My name is Kathryn Sommer and I study at Haverford College, a small school right outside of Philadelphia. I am a premed student majoring in biology, though I also have a passion for art, especially drawing and photography, both of which I enjoy the most when traveling. I was fortunate enough to grow up traveling the world, mainly Europe, as I was born and raised in Germany. On one of my shorter trips in my childhood, I have visited Rome and I cannot wait to get to know the city, the culture, and the people better.</p>

<p>My name is pronounced like &quot;Erika&quot; (Erica and Erykah) with a &quot;y&quot; in front of it. I am the daughter of Honduran immigrant parents, and my hometown is Chicago. I am a first generation undergraduate at Pomona College. In my free time you will find me connecting with people, writing, reading, occasionally attempting to knit, watching videos on YouTube, and enjoying all things nerd.</p>

<p>I am a Literature major at the University of Rochester and am attending Oxford through IES Direct Enrollment in the fall semester of 2015. As an aspiring academic, I am far too invested in the contents of my bookshelf and can often be caught printing an extra copy of completed papers for my own safekeeping. I am fully prepared to take on a completely new and exciting abroad experience both in and out of the classroom, and my love for writing makes each experience even more exciting to share.</p>

<p>Jonathan Thibeaux hails from Lafayette, LA and is a 5th year biology major at Morehouse College. A self-proclaimed &quot;media enthusiast, writer, motivator, and certified dreamer,&rdquo; he is working hard to catapult himself from a pre-medical past into the world of media and television. At Morehouse, he served as the Senior Co-Chair of the Campus Alliance for Student Activities, Co-Campus Based Leader for the Gates Millennium Scholar Group, Maroon Tiger Columnist, and Presidential Ambassador. Choosing to defer his degree for a year, he will be spending a year in Shanghai, China and Cape Town, South Africa for an immersive educational experience. Through his blog and affiliations he hopes to provide a safe and inspiring space for teenagers and adults to document and experience their lives, without the pressure to conform to social constructs. He hopes to one day work in Marketing as a television executive and possibly even becoming the talent of his own show. This fall he will be blogging for Shanghai, China.</p>