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It took me longer than it should have to get to the University of Mississippi. Forty-eight states came and went before it. Mississippi stayed somewhere on the list, not avoided, just never urgent enough to move to the top. Until last week, when I finally arrived at Ole Miss for their International Education Week. State number forty-nine.…

Night had already settled over the court of Hastinapur when the dice were brought forward. The hall was full. Princes, elders, warriors, and courtiers gathered beneath the glow of torchlight, watching what appeared at first to be little more than a royal pastime. Dice games were not unusual among kings. Yet that evening carried a…

There were only four students in the room, and none of them were allowed to speak English. The rule seemed simple enough until the first sentence collapsed halfway through. It was a 200-Level Chinese course, still early enough in the journey that confidence had not yet arrived. The instructor enforced the rule without exception: every question, every…

SNAP! Arms lift. Phones tilt toward skylines, temples, street corners. A moment is captured before it has even been fully experienced. Proof we were there. You don’t actually hear the sound anymore. Most phone cameras are silent now. But the reflex is everywhere. Over the past eight months, I have moved through four continents and eighteen countries. Airports, taxis, colorful…

Each year, I joke that I’m celebrating the anniversary of my 25th birthday. On Tuesday, it was the 28th anniversary — and I chose to mark it on the Great Wall of China. The wind was colder than I had dressed for. It came rushing over the mountains and across the exposed stone, slipping through the layers…

In the span of a few weeks, I’ve moved through three very different spaces in three different countries. India, where I visited GIFT City, hosted Junction91, and spent time on campuses experimenting with new models of global engagement and transnational education. At AIEA in Washington D.C., where international educators were navigating visa instability, political volatility, and a…

“Resistance is futile.” If you’re a Star Trek: The Next Generation fan like me, you’ll recognize this famous catchphrase, spoken by the Borg, a collective that forcibly assimilates species into their hive mind. It signifies the perceived hopelessness of opposing an overwhelming force, representing a “surrender or be destroyed” ultimatum. It is one of the most chilling lines in…

I didn’t watch the Super Bowl halftime show. Before you say, “So what’s the big deal?”, let me offer some context, especially if you’re not an American football fan or if you’re reading this from outside the United States. Each year, the Super Bowl halftime show functions as more than entertainment. It has become one…

Am I moving fast or am I moving right?  Lately, I find myself asking this question over and over. With my life as much as with my business.   For a long time, I believed that doing well - at work, in life, in the choices that mattered - meant keeping pace. Not recklessly, but…

Earlier this week, I took a couple of colleagues to the Gandhi Ashram while we were in Ahmedabad. It wasn’t meant to be a profound moment. It was their first time in the city, and the ashram felt like the right place to take them—quiet, grounded, almost understated. Walk through. Read a few inscriptions. Absorb…

Last week, I wrote about why the world is rethinking America. Not as a protest, and not as a rejection, but as a recalculation — driven by a growing sense that the systems once assumed to be predictable are becoming harder to trust. Once people accept that background systems are fraying — whether in…

Why the World Is Rethinking America: The Country That Forgot Why Talent Came The world is rethinking America. Not loudly. Not angrily. But deliberately. In counseling offices in Delhi and Dubai. In family WhatsApp threads in Lagos and Lima. In spreadsheet comparisons that didn’t exist ten years ago. In the pause before a student clicks…

What Fear Means After You’ve Already Left Thirty-four years ago, I left home. I didn’t call it courage. I didn’t call it bravery. I didn’t even call it a choice. I called it necessary. I was eighteen years old when I landed at JFK Airport on January 7th, 1992. Winter had arrived before I did…

Every new year begins with the same comforting assumption: that what comes next will be a cleaner, calmer extension of what came before. It won’t be. The real risk we carry into 2026 isn’t chaos. It’s the belief that stability is about to return on its own. That politics will cool down. That education will…

The Things We Forget We Survived: An Inventory Before Moving Forward The end of the year is a strange time. Everyone starts talking like philosophers. New year, fresh start, resolutions, hope. It’s the global season of “be your best self,” even though most people step into it with a knot in their stomach and a…