Baylor Alumna Travels the Baylor Line to Europe

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Baylor University will continue to "fling its green and gold afar" through the help of a Baylor alumna who has been named a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar for 2012-2013.
Rachel Canclini, BBA '11, applied for the Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship early last March, was accepted last November and last month received her assignment to live in Belgium and study at the University of Kent at Brussels for a year. Along with earning a graduate degree in international development, Canclini will serve as an international representative and expert of American culture.
"It benefits me because it will help me get a degree and experience another culture, but also because I become a part of the larger Rotary family," Canclini said. "And it benefits other cultures because I get to be the face of the United States, Texas and even Baylor, and dispel what may be stereotypical ideas that may be harmful to cross-cultural relationships. It is essentially about building bridges."
Canclini has been preparing for her international task since graduating from Baylor last year. She worked to help resettle refugees in Virginia through a summer internship with Commonwealth Catholic Charities, and for the past year has studied as a Fellow at the Trinity Forum Academy. Canclini describes the academy as a "nine-month residential graduate program for rising professionals, artists and scholars to develop a foundation for living their entire lives as a Christian calling," and she is currently writing a thesis about the sustainability and redemptive work in the current social justice trends among the "Millennial" generation.
Canclini's former professors are thrilled with her accomplishment and for her future, particularly Tisha Emerson, Ph.D., associate department chair for undergraduate programs and associate professor of economics at Baylor, and a professor Canclini called "most influential."
"Rachel was a very gifted student with a good work ethic and a heart for those in developing countries," Emerson said. "I know that Rachel will one day make a significant contribution to improving the lives of those in developing areas."
by Carmen Galvan, student newswriter, (254) 710-6805