Four Decades in Student Exchange
John J. Crist has spent more than forty years in the international student exchange industry. In 1991, he founded International Cultural Exchange Services as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit with a single mandate: connecting foreign high school students with American host families through the U.S. Department of State’s J-1 visa program. The organization started in Atlanta, Georgia, and has since grown into one of the largest designated J-1 visa sponsors in the country, placing approximately 1,250 exchange students annually with families and schools across all fifty states.
International Cultural Exchange Services relocated its headquarters to Henderson, Nevada, settling into the Galleria Corporate Center at 375 North Stephanie Street. The Henderson office employs seventy-one people and coordinates a national network of roughly five hundred field coordinators who recruit host families, support placed students, and liaise with local school districts. Crist serves as President and CEO; Luiz P. Marzullo, who holds a master’s degree from UNLV, serves as Chief Financial Officer and manages the organization’s financial operations.
Institutional Scale, Nonprofit Mission
International Cultural Exchange Services operates at a scale that places it among the most substantial nonprofits headquartered in Southern Nevada. The organization reports $14.3 million in annual revenue and $7.2 million in assets — figures that reflect the logistical complexity of managing a nationwide student-placement pipeline that spans visa processing, family vetting, school enrollment, insurance coordination, and year-long student support.
International Cultural Exchange Services has maintained a full listing with the Council on Standards for International Educational Travel (CSIET) for thirty consecutive years, a distinction that requires annual compliance reviews and adherence to standards governing student welfare, host-family screening, and organizational transparency. The organization has also been a member of the Alliance for International Educational and Cultural Exchange since 1997. Both affiliations signal sustained institutional credibility in a sector where fly-by-night operators have historically drawn regulatory scrutiny.
International Cultural Exchange Services in the Las Vegas Valley
Henderson has quietly become home to a number of national-scale organizations that operate far beyond the Las Vegas metro, and International Cultural Exchange Services is among the most established. The Galleria Corporate Center headquarters on Stephanie Street anchors the organization’s national operations in a city better known for hospitality and gaming than for nonprofit administration. ICES draws on the valley’s logistics advantages — a major international airport, central time-zone positioning for a nationwide operation, and a growing pool of bilingual professionals — while contributing to Henderson’s emergence as a regional hub for organizations that serve communities well beyond Clark County.
- President & CEO
- John J. Crist
- CFO
- Luiz P. Marzullo
- Founded
- 1991
- Headquarters
- 375 N Stephanie St, Suite 1611, Henderson, NV 89014
- Phone
- (800) 344-3566
- Website
- icesusa.org