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Students

Alternative Break applications now available

September 20, 2010

The office for Student Leadership, Involvement, and Community Engagement is now accepting applications for 2011 spring and summer Alternative Breaks. Trips include locations in Panama, California, Utah, and Florida among others.

Explore a new culture

The Alternative Break program is a week of immersion into different cultural, environmental, and socio-economic communities across the nation and in different countries around the world. Students provide volunteer service in exchange for education about current social and cultural issues facing the host communities.

In one week, students travel and volunteer in another city, state, or country and embark on a journey that will challenge and motivate them on a variety of social causes.

Every spring, approximately 150 Colorado State University students ranging in age, major, upbringing, background, and interest, participate in an Alternative Break experience.

This year's trips include:

• Achiote, Panama - Participants will work with a local community center focusing on environmental conservation and ecotourism with the Panamanian Center for Research and Social Action.


In past semesters, students have volunteered in Moab, Utah, where they learned about plateau ecosystems, removed invasive species, and cleared land to plant trees.

• Catalina, Calif. - Participants stay in Catalina Island Camps, on Catalina Island, which is located southwest of Los Angeles and participate in numerous environmental projects.
• Independence, Calif. - Teaming up with Manzanar National Historic Site, volunteers will work to preserve and learn about a former Japanese internment camp.
• Kanab, Utah - Participants will volunteer for Best Friends Animal Society, the nation’s largest sanctuary for abused and abandoned animals.
• Kissimmee, Fla. - Participants will volunteer for Give Kids the World, an amusement park for children that have terminal illnesses.
• Maryville, Tenn. - Partnering with Once Upon a Time, CSU volunteers will assist with various projects in rural Appalachia and with the Cherokee Nation.
• New Orleans, La. - This trip features volunteer work with Common Ground to support disaster relief and rebuilding of homes as a result of the hurricane Katrina disaster.
• Washington, D.C. - Participants on this trip will volunteer in the nation’s capital providing services to residents of the nation's largest transitional homeless shelter, Community for Creative Non-Violence.

A complete list of locations and trip descriptions can be found online.

Pick up an application

Applications for the trips are now available at the SLICE office on the main level of the Lory Student Center.

Grants (up to $500 per student) are also available to support students in covering trip costs. For more details about the trips, locations, cost, and to pick up a participant application, students can attend an information meeting:

• Tuesday, Oct. 12, from 6-7 p.m. in LSC Rm. 220-222
• Wednesday, Oct. 13, from 6-7 p.m. in LSC Rm. 220-222

Application deadline

Applications should be turned in to the SLiCE office by Wednesday, Oct. 20, at 5 p.m. For more information or an application, contact Jenni Sneden at (970) 491-3922 or stop by the SLiCE Office in the Lory Student Center on the main level, right behind the main Information desk.

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Contact: Stephanie Ashley
E-mail: slice_marketing@mail.colostate.edu
Phone: (970) 491-1483