Meet the New Trustees

SYA is pleased to announce the addition of three new trustees to its governing body: Anne-Carmene (AC) Almonord FR'98, Anne Morrissey ES'85 and Brittany Toscano Gore IT'02, pictured from left to right.

Each brings a passion for and high level of commitment to the SYA mission and looks forward to collaborating with their fellow board members. We look forward to their guidance and expertise in thoughtfully moving SYA forward, continuing to provide immersive, experiential study abroad programs to high school students from all over the world.

We are grateful for their dedication to our current students and faculty, and their vision for future generations.

Anne-Carmene (AC) Almonord FR’98 attended SYA France as a junior from The Dalton School (NY) and is a graduate of Harvard University and earned her Juris Doctorate from Columbia Law School. Almonord is a partner at ArentFox Schiff in New York where she represents clients on various financing transactions, including those involving multifamily housing, manufactured housing, seniors housing and affordable housing. Prior to joining ArentFox, she was an Associate at Morrison & Foerster LLP in Japan. After spending time as an exchange student in France, Almonord led a group of high school students to the south of France with a program called The Experiment in International Living. She also worked as an English Language Teacher at JET Programme in Tokyo and has held marketing positions with PBS’ This Old House. Almonord served as a trustee on the Board of Prep for Prep, a leadership development program based in New York City that provides access to superior education and life-changing opportunities for smart and dedicated students of color.

What are you most excited about as you begin this new volunteer leadership role?
I love about everything about SYA and I am super excited about all of the opportunities inherent in the role of trustee, particularly (1) to work with a team that cares so deeply each aspect of the SYA experience from the students, to the academics, to the host families, and (2) for my service to contribute to strengthening the program so that it can reach even more young people, especially those in communities who may otherwise think that going abroad is not a possibility for them.  

What special skills and expertise do you offer the board and SYA?
I am currently a trustee of The Dalton School and a former trustee of Prep for Prep so I bring a deep appreciation for good governance and incremental improvement on mission-critical items like fundraising, engagement and DEI.  I'm also a partner in an Am-Law 100 law firm, raising two young children in my hometown of Brooklyn so all of my days are grounded in empathetic, efficient and diligent problem-solving; I am happy to now share those skills with SYA.   

What’s something about you that people might be surprised to learn?
I speak, read and write basic Japanese because of twists and turns in my life that I attribute to SYA.  I've also never seen the "original" Star Wars trilogy. 

Anne Morrissey ES’85 attended SYA Spain as a junior from Kent Place School (NJ) and is a graduate of DePauw University, where she majored in political science and Spanish, and Harvard Business School (MBA). Morrissey builds high performance finance organizations primarily for early-stage companies. She recently served as the chief financial officer at the asset management platform SigFig. She worked for and helped take public Fitbit and LeapFrog. Morrissey started her career in Latin American banking at J.P. Morgan Chase and Salomon Smith Barney.

What are you most excited about as you begin this new volunteer leadership role?
 I deeply believe in SYA’s mission. I know first-hand what a transformative experience SYA delivers to its students. A touchstone of my life was the year that I spent with SYA in Spain, and I want to make sure that the mission of this organization continues for future generations.

What special skills and expertise do you offer the board and SYA?
With a background in building and leading finance organizations for early-stage technology companies, I have deep experience in leveraging limited resources through a thoughtful and deliberative process to create professional organizations that deliver extraordinary results.

What’s something about you that people might be surprised to learn?
People are often surprised to learn that once upon a time, I was a competitive cyclist in Indiana living the “Breaking Away” lifestyle.

Brittany Toscano Gore IT’02 attended SYA Italy as a junior from Sidwell Friends School (DC) and graduated from St. Mary’s College of Maryland, where she majored in English and political science, and earned master’s degrees from Georgetown University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in Italian Studies and in Learning, Design and Technology. As Director of Strategy and Communication at Georgetown University’s Red House, Brittany works to develop, implement and monitor a strategy that aligns the priorities of the University, its stakeholders and the challenges facing students today to shape a portfolio of emerging models of learning environments and experiences. These are designed to facilitate a wider and more holistic range of student outcomes to meet the needs and challenges of today’s world and the future. Over the past ten years, Brittany has held positions across educational institutions where she has helped launch new initiatives designed to address some of the most complex challenges facing higher education. Before joining Georgetown, Brittany managed institutional donor relations at the Columbia Journalism School where she launched and stewarded the school’s Technology Council. Prior to finding her place in higher education, she held positions both in internal and external communications capacities that served clients from diverse industries, including aerospace, finance and education.

What are you most excited about as you begin this new volunteer leadership role?When I think back on the year I spent in Viterbo, it was really a starting point for me. It was my first trip abroad and my world was, literally and figuratively, expanded in a profound way. It’s an education that extends beyond the classroom, and one many of us carry forward into so many facets of our adult lives. There is almost no greater gift I could imagine being in a position to give than to support SYA in providing more students the opportunity to experience the learning that happens inside and outside the classroom within the SYA community(ies). There has never been a more critical need for the type of education that SYA provides.  I can’t think of a better investment for our future than the education of the next generations. 

What special skills and expertise do you offer the board and SYA?
My graduate work was focused on study abroad program models and learning outcomes, and my work today continues to focus on how the design and implementation of innovative and experiential learning opportunities can be more impactful and more accessible to all students. 

What’s something about you that people might be surprised to learn?
Last year, our family hosted a high school student from Italy: the 16-year-old granddaughter of my host parents in Viterbo!