2008 Field Trips

Keeping with tradition, Arthur Morgan School students and staff set forth on their three week service and learning field trips this year in February. Experience has taught us that these trips provide unique opportunities for passionate learning that can really change kids' lives. Therefore, field trips have become an essential component of the experiential learning process at AMS and are the focus of months of study and preparation. Students not only spend time delving into the topics they will be exploring on their trip but also help in the planning process down to the minor details. Community service and work projects are scheduled throughout the journey with their focus being centered on the prior chosen topic of interest.

    

This year there were three field trips with an average of seven students and three staff per group. Their focuses were on Hunger and Homelessness; Power Distribution, Sources, and Impacts; and Immigration and Border Issues. They traveled as far as Albany, NY; Dove Springs, AZ; and Monterey, Mexico respectively, often staying with friends and alumni of AMS along the way.

The Hunger and Homelessness Trip visited soup kitchens and homeless shelters in Washington DC, Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and even did some lobbying in New York. While our students and staff were doing service work at the shelters, they met and visited with volunteers and homeless people who were willing to share their stories. Iris Rountree, a 7th grade student says, “I know that I have come home feeling like I can do something about hunger and homelessness and that it doesn't have to be a part of our society- even a kid can make a difference.”

Traveling to Tennessee, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, the Power Trip came away with a much clearer understanding of how our electricity is produced and the effects it has on our environment. One of many stops along the way was Buffalo Mountain Wind Farm run by the TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority) where they were able to see the enormous wind turbines and learn how much power they produce. They also visited the Los Alamos National Laboratories, and Dove Springs, AZ where they did service work on the Navajo Reservation. John Murray, a 9th grader writes, “After seeing everything that's available out there and how resources can affect the way everyone lives, it's inspired me to change. I've noticed myself striving to conserve energy any way that I can.”

And our final group, whose study encompassed political, geographic, ecological, economic, and social borders, arrived after much driving at Refugio del Rio Grande, a camp for political refugees in Harlingen Texas, where they did service work and visited the Border Patrol Station. Upon completing their work there, they moved on to Cuatro Cienegas, a small town outside of Monterey, Mexico, where students and staff stayed at a research center and studied the ecosystems of the endemic fish and turtles. From there they traveled to New Orleans where they did service work with Common Ground, and ended their trip with a stay in Americus, Georgia at Koinonia farm. Lucia Barrus, an 8th grader tells us that one of her favorite parts of the trip was going to Matamoros and learning about the people and their life styles.

By Susan Higgins