Location: West End, BVI

A long, long time ago, at a dock slip far, far away, the crew of Ewak eagerly awaited their students’ arrival.

After a long week of training and preparing the ship- we are beyond excited to be welcoming our students aboard! We can’t wait to get underway and start our service extravaganza. In just a few days, we’ll be fully immersed in the community: working with school children, monitoring seagrass, and of course, turtle tagging! All we got left is to welcome the most important members of our crew, the students!

Elliot Evins Growing up in several contrasting parts of the United States, Elliot developed an appetite for travel and exploration at a young age. He fostered a passion for global service and socially responsible volunteering as a student with Global Expeditions Group during high school and university. This eventually brought him to a position leading programs and travel camps for teens in the same countries he originally experienced as a student. Elliot holds professional certifications in sailing, field research, and wilderness medicine that allow him to provide his students with the same incredible experience and lessons our programs gave him. When not running summer programs in the BVI, China, Thailand, India, Costa Rica or Ecuador, Elliot lives in Boulder Colorado and spends his weekends sailing, producing music, or bumbling his way through ambitious do-it-yourself projects.

Griffin Ball If you ask Griffin where she’s from, she’ll probably reply “the East Coast.” She grew up in Northern Virginia (right outside Washington, DC), but then moved with her family to New Hampshire right before heading down to South Carolina for college. This May she will be graduating from the University of South Carolina with a degree in Tourism Management. Griffin loves to travel, especially to the Caribbean; during her college years, she has studied abroad in Cuba, served on a mission trip in Haiti and hiked the Petit Piton in St. Lucia. Griffin is so excited to join the GoBeyond crew this summer! She was a student in the BVI back in the summer of 2013, and this will be her first summer on staff.

Dara Growing up on a small sanctuary island along the gulf coast of Florida, Dara has long had an appreciation for the beauty of our environment and the role we play in its stewardship. Her love of the ocean grew during her own BVI adventure with GoBeyond seven years ago, and she’s thrilled to return as field staff this summer! Dara graduated from Vanderbilt University with a dual-major in ecology and anthropology. Through her study abroad, she was able to engage with indigenous cultures long dedicated to marine preservation, and also enjoyed up-close-and-personal escapades with the ocean world. Highlights included swimming with wild dusky dolphins in New Zealand, diving with sharks in Fiji, and gliding along with giant sea turtles on the Great Barrier Reef – experiences which have only strengthened her resolve to contribute toward a healthy restoration of our blue planet. When not underwater, Dara enjoys hiking, concert-going, and enthusiastic conversations about environmental justice.