This summer, biology teacher Kate Herrick-Madden is going to lead a trip abroad to Belize. This will be her second official time leading students and their parents abroad, despite many other plans to. The trip will be eight days long and will be all about exploring the ecosystems like mountainous regions and the coastlines.
“When I was in high school, I had an opportunity to travel. One year I went to what was then the former Soviet Union,” Herrick-Madden said. This trip to Estonia, Russia and Ukraine, led by her high school teacher, inspired her to start leading trips of her own. “It really gave me contextual support for what I was actually learning in high school.”
Later, in college, Herrick-Madden went to Bermuda to do biological research with her biology professor. She then went to Southern Africa with her Peace Corps where she served in Lautu. Herrick-Madden thinks that these abroad experiences were really what helped her flourish as a student and she thinks that these trips she leads abroad are a way of paying the opportunities she had forward.
Previously, Herrick-Madden had planned a trip to Costa Rica, which took three years because of COVID’s intervention. Also, she had planned to go to the Galapagos but pulled back due to safety concerns. “I take the safety of my students very seriously and we decided it was not a stable enough situation, so we canceled that trip and a lot of those people have rolled into these future trips,” she says.
If you’re wondering what activities happen when you go on these trips, this year they’ll do things like snorkeling and hiking along with community service. A big part of the trips Herrick-Madden leads are the ecological pieces. In Costa Rica, they did tours of chocolate and coffee plantations to look at the economic factors of the country. “So it’s not just oh, I’m gonna go to Starbucks and get a cup of coffee, but [rather], this is all of the process that goes into getting that casual cup of coffee.”
To go on the trips, you must pay for the trip: airfare, transportation, two meals a day and hotels. Also, money to tip the personal guide who would give the tours and is with you for the whole time. “I would want kids who are gonna be engaged and want to participate, as opposed to kind of going just to mess around. I don’t really think that’s an issue, because when you see you commit to kind of spending money to travel, it’s a commitment, and so you wanna get the most out of it,” Herrick-Madden said.
After Belize, Herrick-Madden will lead a trip to the British Isles; Ireland, England and Scotland. “We’re gonna fly into Ireland, travel around the southern tip of Ireland, take a ferry to Wales, go up to Edinburgh and down through York to see that ancient city of York,” she says. “Then down through the Roman baths in Stonehenge, and then over to London.” The trip will be around 17 days.
Herrick-Madden is excited to lead this Belize trip along with her future trips. Her biology background will ensure a trip full of learning about ecosystems and she is excited to expand student’s knowledge.