About Brian
Brian Lettinga joined Search Associates in 2020 after a 24 year career in international education, split evenly between the classroom and school leadership, a background that lets him speak to both sides of an international teaching career. Today he works with both experienced educators and those just beginning their international careers, and serves as our Intern Coordinator, guiding college seniors and recent graduates through their first year long teaching placement abroad.
Brian earned his Bachelor’s degree in Political Science and International Relations from Western Michigan University before heading overseas, where he spent his first decade teaching fourth and fifth grade in Saipan, in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, followed by schools in Venezuela and Kenya. Along the way, he added a Master’s in Education from Aquinas College. He then returned to Caracas as Upper School Principal and IBDP Coordinator, later serving as Elementary and Middle School Principal, and went on to earn a second Master’s degree, this one in Educational Leadership from Lehigh University, as his roles in school leadership grew.
In 2011, Brian moved to the International School of Belgrade as Lower School Principal, where he spent seven years overseeing the Early Childhood and Primary Years Programs, guiding the school through a new campus build and an IBO reauthorization, and picking up fundraising and strategic planning experience along the way. He later served as Middle School Principal at the Walworth Barbour American International School in Israel, where he also coached varsity baseball. Throughout his career, Brian has stayed closely engaged with the wider international education community, from his work with CEESA, AMLE, and ELMLE to hands on accreditation service with AdvancED.
Brian and his wife, Annalisa, raised their two children overseas, an experience that gave him firsthand understanding of the opportunities and challenges of building a life abroad and raising Third Culture Kids. He’s now based in Michigan, and brings that experience directly to the educators he works with today, especially those weighing that same leap for their own families, a decision he understands better than most, having made it himself more than two decades ago.
