Olga holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology specializing in peoples and cultures of Central America and the Caribbean. She started her graduate career at the fabled site of Tikal in the jungles of Guatemala where she worked with the original University of Pennsylvania archaeological and ecological project. She then continued her studies in northern Belize, where she studied nutrition and economics of the modern Maya, living and working in remote villages with her archaeologist husband and children over a period of 8 years. As a result of this research she became the regional coordinator for a major agricultural development project funded by USAID, aimed at improving training and information dissemination to farmers in the Caribbean region.

This work took her to Jamaica, Dominica, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, Trinidad and many other islands where she worked directly with rural families and gained an intimate knowledge of their history and way of life. At the end of this project she continued in international development working with the World Bank, the UN, and IFAD on projects in the Caribbean, Central America, Asia and Eastern Europe. Her career was interrupted, however, when she was widowed early in life, and required to return Minnesota so her children could continue their education at home. Undaunted, she started a new business at home in the area of food safety.

In 2002 she sold the business, retired and returned to her first love, anthropology and the study of human cultures, but this time working as a lecturer in the travel industry. She has a passion for the peoples of the Caribbean and keeps in close touch with the residents of her research village. She is writing the first major guidebook for the site of Tikal, and volunteers with various economic development projects around the world.