Geri Critchley has been involved in community organizing and the international field for more than 25 years. After returning from the Peace Corps in Senegal, West Africa, Geri worked with international students at Crossroads International Student Center at the University of Chicago and then in international education exchange as the director of The Experiment in International Living’s (EIL)/World Learning Washington, DC office and later the director of the Canadian office.
Each year, she hosts the EIL DC Ambassadors – scholarship recipients – who go abroad each summer. Geri also served as an escort for international visitors through the U.S. State Dept. After moving to Rochester, Minnesota, Geri founded and directed a community-based international center which fostered educational cross cultural links within the community. Grants from USIA and the Mayo Clinic launched the center which served 12,000 participants in the first year. In Toronto, Canada, Geri worked in Cross Cultural Communication in the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship and Culture creating their first cross cultural training resources library. She has been involved with Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCVs) organizing many events such as a Presidential campaign benefit in support of Bill Clinton’s vision of community service – bringing the world back home. She served on the National Review Committee of the Corporation for National and Community Service and assisted at Camp Shriver and at the Special Olympics World Games in addition to raising funds for African athletes to participate. International Career Roundtables were created by Geri at TransCentury which she facilitated then expanded into a network throughout Washington, DC. In Dublin, Ireland, Geri served as the Director of The Irish American Partnership which promotes peace and prosperity in Ireland both North and South and raised funds for students from N Ireland the Republic of Ireland to participate in a Peace Institute in DC. She led student groups to Mexico, France and Ireland, led an art tour to France; studied on scholarships in France and Ireland (James Joyce) and in Mexico, and traveled from China to the North Pole to Timbuktu often writing travel articles.
Geri worked in international development at MSI (www.msiworldwide.com), took a two year sabbatical and is now consulting for World Learning/The Experiment in International Living, career advising on international humanitarian service and writing. Recently she organized a benefit with Peter Yarrow for the Alliance for Peacebuilding. She will be cycling 20 miles in the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Challenge with TEAM SARGE at the Washington Monument in appreciation of the Shrivers’ lifelong legacy of service. Geri has a Masters in International Education and Training, and her family is profiled in The Giving Family by the Council on Foundations and in Congressman Tony Hall’s Changing the Face of Hunger.