Emma Impavido Senior Program Manager Emma Impavido was born in the UK. She spent 3 years as a child in Paris and was bitten by the travel bug at an early age. She has traveled extensively throughout Europe and spent extended periods in Venice, Milan, and the south of France. Emma holds a degree in Italian and French from Reading University, UK and a Masters degree in Art History from Warwick University, UK. Emma worked for six years for Britain’s leading cultural tour operator, Martin Randall Travel organizing educational tours and music festivals in historic buildings along the Danube, Rhine, and most memorably in Venice. In 2000 she moved to Washington DC. She worked at Smithsonian Journeys for just under a year before joining ATA in April 2001. Emma loves the thrill of pulling together a program and talking about her favorite cities and regions.

Phyllis Keil Senior Program Manager, Russia & Central Europe After a People to People trip to the former Soviet Union in 1988, Phyllis fell in love with the culture, language, and people of this vast and varied country. She decided to return to college and graduated with a B.A. in Russian Studies from Kutztown University in Pennsylvania. During a study abroad program in Moscow in the summer of 1991, she witnessed first hand the extraordinary events of the August coup. Phyllis also holds a Master’s Certificate in Russian Business from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She has studied in Moscow and in St. Petersburg and taught elementary and high school math at a private Russian school in Moscow. Also an enthusiastic hiker, she participated in a 9-day hut-to-hut hike from Chamonix, France, to Arolla, Switzerland, with other ATA staffers led by our fearless president Dave Parry.

Michelle Korczynski Senior Program Manager, Latin America, Iberia, Australia/New Zealand, Scandinavia Fascination with ancient civilizations in Latin America prompted Michelle to study Spanish and the Americas. She holds undergraduate degrees in Latin American Studies and Journalism from Boston University and a Master’s in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin. Michelle lived in Colombia for two years, teaching English, attending university classes, and working as a photojournalist for the country’s most prestigious newspaper, El Tiempo. Her interest in living abroad also took her to Costa Rica, Spain, and Italy.  While at ATA, she has continued to travel to numerous countries throughout Latin America, Scandinavia, Europe and the South Pacific.

Janet Varn Senior Program Manager Janet’s career in program design began at the Smithsonian Institution where she created tours across North America, and traveled with Smithsonian study tours throughout Asia, Russia, and many countries in Europe. It is the western U.S., though, that keeps calling her back. After her first cross-country skiing adventure in Yellowstone 20+ years ago, she finds ways to hike in the Rockies and explore archeological sites in the Southwest desert whenever she can. Janet became a telecommuting staffer too after moving somewhat west — to Oak Park, a turn of the century Chicago suburb filled with old elm trees and Frank Lloyd Wright houses.

Chris Roper Senior Program Manager, Asia Chris's fascination with Asia began as a child when, at the age of 5, he accompanied his family on a 6-month tour of the region during which he skateboarded through the botanical gardens of Jakarta and learned to eat Chinese food with a pair of pint-sized chopsticks. During college, Chris studied for a semester in Qingdao, China, where he practiced with the women's volleyball team, and though a foot taller than anyone else on the team, he was the worst player on the field.  Fluent in Mandarin, Chris also learned Vietnamese in graduate school, where he studied Sino-Vietnamese border trade.  Since joining ATA, where he designs our programs to Asia, Chris has enjoyed traveling to China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Bhutan, Japan, South Korea, Mongolia, Kyrgyz Republic, Uzbekistan and India.

Justin Mack Grandtravel/Program Manager From his first cross-country plane trip at the age of 5, Justin has had the travel bug.  Over the years, his travels have taken him to 49 states in the US and to 4 different continents around the world.  Memorable moments in his travels include standing on the Great Wall in China, exploring the underground in Edinburgh, celebrating New Year’s in Prague, and snorkeling at the Great Barrier Reef.  In addition to travel, Justin enjoys biking, photography and hiking.  After graduating from the University of Colorado at Boulder with a degree in Marketing, Justin relocated to Washington DC.  As the Program Manager for Grandtravel, he shares his passion for travel with grandparents and grandchildren.

Edward Yan Program Manager Hailing from Cleveland, Ohio as an offspring of two natives of Guangdong, China; Ed remembers a childhood that involved being packed into a car for road trips to the Chinatowns of Toronto, New York City and Chicago. His first realization of the concept of countries came to him when he wondered out loud to his parents “Why do they use the same money in New York as they do in Cleveland, but when we go to Toronto, we have to get a different kind of money?” After spending 6 months in Guangdong and Hong Kong and being immersed entirely into a non-American culture, Ed has been fascinated with the World and wishes to visit as many places and sample as many cuisines as possible. Since then, his travels have taken him all over the States and Canada, England, Mexico, various islands of the Caribbean, Costa Rica, Japan, South Korea and back to China on numerous occasions. Ed speaks English and Cantonese fluently, has dabbled in French and is currently learning Spanish. Ed graduated from the University of Akron with a BS in Business Administration/Marketing and supports the professional sports teams known as the Cleveland Indians, the Cleveland Browns, DC United and Aston Villa FC.