Who is Freedom Quest?

Freedom Quest is a non-profit organization that we intended to form in the United States, but not filing for 501(c)(3) status, as all income would be "unrelated business income" which would be taxable anyway. Due to the difficulty in early 2019 getting the guests for the May 2019 tours, we decided not to form the organization yet, but rather to run the tours through Rick Olson's personal account (no means was found to run it through the Prior Lake Rotary account). The net proceeds of the May 2019 tours ($3,578.85) was donated to LCC International University for student scholarships. In 2022, $2002 was donated. Accounting for 2023 is in progress, but the net profit/donations to LCC may be near $10,000.

 For the May 2023 amd 2024 tours (and for the 2020 and 2021 tours which had to be cancelled), we decided to continue that pattern. After these tours,we will again evaluate the economic viability of officially forming Freedom Quest and allowing it to continue independently of Prior Lake Rotary.

The Mission of Freedom Quest:

A. use surplus revenues to award scholarships to LCC International University (“LCC”) students,

B. acquaint American and other English speaking tourists to Eastern and Central European countries that few know much about,

C. create jobs for LCC graduates and summer jobs for LCC students and

D. promote world peace and classical liberal ideas such as minority rights, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech and the press through greater understanding.

The revenues will come from conducting a touring company business, concentrating on tours in countries in former Soviet Union countries or countries in the former Eastern Block, where many Americans have not previously traveled. So, if these tours earn a profit, the excess will be used for scholarships for LCC students.

All of the funds of these tours will be handled by Rick Olson, the Executive Director of Freedom Quest, and perhaps even in his name until the Freedom Quest bank accounts can be set up.

How it all began:

Rick Olson was invited to join friends from Washington State on a 12 day bicycle tour of the Baltics on a tour conducted by Baltic Bike Travel in September, 2017. One of the organizers of the group was the Chairman of the Board of LCC International University. While going through Klaipeda, Lithuania, we had a tour of the campus and dinner with the President of the University.

Rick discovered that LCC welcomed visiting professors from the United States to come teach for 2 months (or longer), offering free accommodations on campus. That sounded like a cheap adventure, so Rick went to teach there in January and February, 2018. He returned in September and October, 2018 to teach two courses: "Entrepreneurship" and "Economics and Law". In the Entrepreneurship class, the class project was to draft a business plan of a touring company, for which the 2019 Rotary tour would be a "trial run".

                 The Baltics                                                LCC International University

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