from abcnews.com:
"One student and two professors from a Florida university mission group are missing in the chaos and rubble of Haiti's earthquake, despite the efforts of a private search team hired by the school to find its missing staff and students.
The private contractor was commissioned by Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla. So far, the contractor has located 11 members of the aid group Food for Poor that had landed in Haiti just a day before the earthquake hit.
The search is still on for 22-year-old Christine Gianacaci and faculty advisors Dr. Patrick Hartwick and Dr. Richard Bruno.
"The game plan today is to try and find these people," university spokesman Jason Hughes said. "The mood here is somber, but hopeful."
"We still have three members of our community that we're eager to hear about," he added.
Hughes did not name the contractor on the ground in Haiti helping to evacuate the students and look for the three missing group members, but said that the contractor's staff were provided to them by the insurance that the university routinely takes out for groups traveling abroad.
The severity of the situation in Haiti, said Hughes, prompted the use of a private search team.
"It is not routine in any way to use this sort of service," said Hughes. "Only in extraordinary circumstances would you have this ability."
Hughes said that the contractors arrived Wednesday morning on two helicopters, but did not know how many people were involved in the rescue effort.
Hartwick is the dean of the schools' college of education and Bruno is an assistant professor in the College of Liberal Education.
A MySpace page appearing to belong to Gianacaci was last visited on Jan.3, and lists elementary education as her major. A quote on the pages says, "These are the best days of our lives."
The group of 14 had been staying at the Hotel Montana in Port-au-Prince when the earthquake hit shortly before 5 p.m. Tuesday.
The 11 students who have been found are reported to be in or near the U.S. Embassy, according to Hughes, and the university is working with the contractor to get them home.
Other Americans Missing in Haiti
"What we know is that when students are identified they are taken to the safest location that they can be taken to the quickest, and that may be the Dominican Republic," said Hughes. The Dominican Republic shares the island of Hispanola with Haiti.
Several family members who had children traveling to Haiti convened at Lynn University to wait for news together, said Hughes.
Around the country, student groups and missionaries are working to account for members of their communities.
Two student groups traveling from the University of Wisconsin-Madison were accounted for and are now trying to get out of the country.
In Indianapolis, two churches are still waiting to find out whether members on missions trips to Haiti are safe, according to the Associated Press. The nine-person group was working at an orphanage 45 miles from the epicenter of the earthquake.
According to the Virginian-Pilot, Andrew Foster, an eighth grader from Virginia Beach is missing in Haiti with an older relative, according to the child's father, Robert Foster.
Foster said he spoke to his son just after the earthquake hit when he was driving with his uncle from the airport in Haiti. The last he heard was when the uncle said, "Oh, my god, I have to get out of here," before the line went dead.
Two New York University students, Nathalie Pierre and Greg Childs, who arrived in Haiti just before the earthquake have not been heard from since.
The missing are both history students, doing research in Haiti as part of their doctoral program."
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