Outreach Trips

During each academic break, Outreach & Community Service offers several alternative projects in various and different cultural settings, in which students and faculty alike may participate.

• WHAT IS AN ALTERNATIVE BREAK (OUTREACH TRIP) ?

   An alternative break program places teams of students in domestic and international settings to engage in community service and experiential learning.

   Students leave behind the world of books and laboratories, entering a world in which communities grapple with issues as varied as racism, hunger, inadequate housing, and environmental degradation. Communities benefit from the tangible work completed, while students gain broader and understanding of the world around them.

   The real benefit of an alternative break, however, lies not in the experience of the week itself, but in the challenge it creates for students to build on their cultural experience and world view. An effective alternative break experience must push its participants to question their own comfort zone, spark critical thinking about social problems, and inspire continued action in the name of communal welfare.

Outreach Trips - 2006-2007

Fall Break October 13-16, 2006

The Katrina outreach trip to New Orleans area focused on working the cleaning & clearing projects with the Episcopal Diocese in the New Orleans area working with Habitat for Humanity project in St. Bernard Parish to clean up the parish and boost recovery efforts in St Bernard. The trip was limited to 35 students and 1 staff member and costs $55.00.

Christmas Break January 6-13, 2007

The Jamaica outreach trip focuses on building either a house for a family or a craft building for an individual artisan. We also staff a home of safety for physically and mentally handicapped children. At one of the community development organizations where we spend time, there are always small projects like mural painting, concrete work, building beds, etc. Hangin' with the Jamaican children and adults and listening to their folklore is an essential element to this experience. Leaders: Dixon Myers, Bill Mauzy and a student leader. The trip is limited to 18 people and costs $950.00.

Brami lives in Trenchtown and makes clay figurines of Rastas playing instruments.

Spring Break March 15-24, 2007

The Costa Rica outreach trip has been designed as an environmental-tract service trip. Students work with Cloud Forest School in Monteverde with a reforestation project, organic gardening, and assisting with the maintenance of their outdoor classroom. There is also a project (ANAI) with the Gandoca Wildlife Refuge building hatcheries and relocating the eggs of the endangered leatherback sea turtle population. ANAI marine Program has worked with the local community in Gandoca to protect the Leatherback Sea Turtle nesting population in the Gandoca-Manzanillo Wildlife Refuge by improving the beach habitat for turtle nesting and protecting the turtle eggs from poaching and domestic predators. Students live with Costa Rican families and work closely with local environmental specialists and biologists from around the world. Leaders: Dr. Tom Howick, Bill Mauzy and a student leader. The trip is limited to 16 and costs $1,130.00.

Children playing in the cloud forest

The Ecuador outreach trip's main focus is working with youth. The host organization for this trip in Quito is Youth World an organization whose emphasis is training youth ministry leaders and working to reach out to the children of the city. Our site host, Cameron Vivanco (Sewanee - C' 06), offers several opportunities for our group participation, including drama, sports, and recreation. There are also service opportunities at the Quito city dump where a large population of people acquire their daily substance. Many groups have assisted with construction projects at various church locations. Leaders: Dean Eric Hartman, Dr. Rich Kipp and a student leader. The trip is limited to 16 and costs $1,660.00

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The New York outreach trip is comprised of two work sites: the GMHC (Gay Men's Health Crisis) Organization and Momentum. The staffs at each site will allow students the opportunity to participate in direct service and get a hands-on education as to how large non-profit organizations operate. GMHC is an organization that was formed in 1981 to provide compassionate care to New Yorkers with AIDS. They educate to keep citizens healthy and advocate for fair and effective public policies. It has more than 8,400 clients and uses 6,500 volunteers and 300 staff members with a $30 million yearly budget. Momentum, one of the volunteer's main responsibilities is to help support the network of food distribution. Leaders: to be announced. The trip is limited to 16 and costs $900.00.

The Katrina outreach trip: New Orleans area focused on working the cleaning & clearing projects with Habitat for Humanity project in St. Bernard Parish to clean up the parish and boost recovery efforts in St Bernard. The trip was limited to 14 students and 1 staff member and costs $100.00.

The Miami outreach trip was centered around classroom tutoring at the secondary level. They also participated in a Habitat for umanity prject, worked in a local nursing home and helped with an environmental project. Leaders: Barbara Banks and a student leader. The trip was limited to 16 and costs $480.00

Haiti outreach trips

Montrouis & Cange
This trip is part of the Sewanee/Haiti Initiative. A dentist and dental assistant from Sewanee will be leading a small group to Monytouis, Haiti located sixty miles north of Port-au-Prince. The group will be providing dental services to residents in the village through at an Episcopal Church. Students interested in dental or medical care may want to take advantage of this opportunity, although it is open to all students. Leaders: Dr. Bruce and Sandy Baird. The trip is limited to 7 and costs $990.00.

Service/Learning Course - International Service
Compotent during Spring Break (March 15-24, 2007)

Les Cayes & Cange, Haiti

Art 363: Advance Documentary Projects in Photography

The course builds on Art 363 and consolidates methods and issues pretaining to making photographic documentaries. Class projects and discussions examine the cultural and socio-political impact of this genre, as well as the genre's core triangulation points of subjectivity, and truth.

*Prerequiiste: Art 363 or premission of instructor.
(Malde)
Leaders: Deborah McGrath, Pradip Malde and Dixon Myers
Size of class is 10.

Biology 232: Human Health and the Environment
This course incorporates concepts of environmental and health science with emerging issues associated with environmental threats to human health. Topics include human population growth and food security, toxicity and toxins, food borne illness, emerging disw\ease, waste and wastewater, air pollution and assessing human risk. Field trips provide applied learning experiences in the science underlying environmental stress and disease. To explore the interaciton of poverty, environmental degradation and disease firsthand, students take a 10-day outreach trip over springbreak to Haiti and participate in projects addressing local environmental problems.
Prerequiiste: Biol 131.
(McGrath)
Leaders: Deborah McGrath, Pradip Malde and Dixon Myers
Size of class: 10.

The Haiti outreach trips this year were influenced by Tracy Kidder's Mountains beyond Mountains book that all incoming Freshman were required to read this year (2006-2007). The above trips are going to have an opportunity to visit Cange and The Rev. LaFontant who started the Episcopal Mission in the early 80's during the Spring Break trip.

Paul Farmer and Tracy Kidder spoke to a packed house in Cambridge, MA, which had selected Kidder's Mountains Beyond Mountains as this year's "Cambridge Reads" book to be read by the entire city. Download or stream the event the Cambridge Community Television website.

• HOW DO I APPLY?

Pick up a written application in the Community Outreach office or in the SPO during the Fall Semester. Once you have completed the application, turn it in promptly. The staff will read each application, at which point you will be invitied to sign up for a group interview. Limited space on each trips makes it impossible to guarantee that every applicant will be given his or her first choice.

Last updated on May 4, 2007