Belize & Guatamala Aventura Recap

New Summit Academy students and staff have just returned from an extraordinary experience exploring ancient and modern cultures in Belize and Guatemala!

To prepare for the trip – to be travelers rather than tourists – teachers engaged students in a week of workshops, studying the history of the area and current issues affecting the people. Students also participated in workshops focusing on how our senses are heightened through travel. The objective of this guiding theme is to help raise student awareness of the human experience, both through their travels and in their day-to-day lives at NSA and back home.

While traveling in Belize and Guatemala, students engaged in once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, including:

• Exploring the breathtaking Mayan sites of Caracol, Tika and Xunantunich
• Performing community service in the tropical gardens at their jungle lodge
• Spelunking the Cave of the Stone Sepulcher, home of Mayan sacrificial objects
• Snorkeling in the second-largest reef on Earth (including Shark Ray Alley!)
• Documenting their experiences in a film which will premiere in September

Students returned to campus energized by this amazing opportunity, and ready to begin the quarter. Keep an eye out for our upcoming Documentary Film Premiere issue at the end of the quarter, and a shared link of the student film!