Once BTI,
Always BTI

BTI is Now Closed

A Final Message to the BTI Family

As August comes to a close, so does an extraordinary chapter in my life.

There are some goodbyes that are simply too big for a few words, and saying goodbye to the BioTechnical Institute of Maryland is one of them.

When I became Executive Director of BTI, I inherited an organization with a remarkable history and a powerful mission: creating pathways into the life sciences for people who might otherwise never have been given the opportunity. What I came to understand very quickly was that BTI was never simply a workforce development program.

BTI was, is and will always be a family.

It was the student who walked through our doors unsure of what was possible and left believing differently about their future. It was the graduate who landed that first laboratory position and came back to tell us about it. It was the employer who took a chance on our talent. The funder who believed in our mission. The community partner who opened another door. The staff member who went above and beyond their job description. And the Board members who volunteered their time, expertise, and resources, and who believed in this organization.

To our students and alumni: you will always be the heart of BTI. I hope you carry with you the knowledge that your accomplishments are yours. BTI may have helped open a door, but you did the work to walk through it. Continue learning. Continue growing. Continue taking up space in laboratories, research institutions, biotechnology companies, universities, and every room where your talent belongs.

To our funders, donors, employers, and community partners: thank you for investing in the possibility. Your support allowed BTI to provide tuition-free education, hands-on laboratory training, internships, professional development, and pathways to careers that changed lives. Every investment you made in BTI was ultimately an investment in a person, a family, and the Baltimore community.

To our Board members, past and present: thank you for your stewardship, your counsel, your advocacy, and especially for standing with BTI through both its celebrations and its most difficult decisions.

And to the BTI staff: there simply aren't enough words. Thank you for your commitment to our students, to one another, and to this mission. I am incredibly proud of what we accomplished together.

Leading BTI has been one of the greatest privileges of my professional life. There were challenges, celebrations, long days, difficult decisions, laughter, graduations, first jobs, new partnerships, and countless moments that reminded me exactly why this work mattered.

While I wish BTI's story could continue differently, I refuse to define its legacy by the fact that its doors are closing.

BTI's legacy lives in people.

It lives in every graduate who discovered a career they didn't know was possible. In every employer whose workforce became stronger because a BTI graduate joined their team. In every family whose economic trajectory changed because someone was given access to an opportunity. And in every person who now knows that they belong in science.

So, this isn't how I say goodbye to the mission.

It's simply how I say goodbye to this chapter.

To everyone who has been part of the BTI family over the years: thank you for trusting us, believing in us, challenging us, supporting us, and walking alongside us.

I leave this chapter deeply grateful, incredibly proud, and forever honored to have served.

Once BTI, always BTI.

With gratitude,

Dr. Brandy Carter
Executive Director
BioTechnical Institute of Maryland