Description

Join High School Unplugged this year as we travel throughout Guatemala visiting communities and meeting with community leaders.

The course offered this year is Grade 11 - Genocide and Crimes against Humanity. CHG38

This is a Toronto District School Board developed course and it consists of 110 hours of study.

We will examine the genocide commited against the Mayan people as well as other genocides throughout the world.

Highlights

Tikal: A voyage to the Mayan Past. This is the largest archaeological site in the West and one of the wonders of the world. The Mayan ruins at Tikal on the Yucatan Peninsula are simply breath-taking. Tikal is the perfect place to study the pre-Columbian world and to question what makes civilizations rise and fall and to ponder the mysteries of archaeology.

Lake Atitlan: glitters like an azure and turquoise jewel under the shadows of three volcanoes in the Mayan highlands. It has been called the most beautiful lake in the world and it is true. Atitlan is ringed by Mayan villages where the people speak Kaqchikel or Tz'utujil. Your home base is the international town of Panajachel, where you will study at the Atitlan Multicultural Academy and have day-long adventures in one of the most culturally distinct and naturally bedazzling environments on earth.

Rio Negro (Chixoy Dam): In the early 1980s during the Civil War, the Government of Guatemala forced the community of Rio Negro to move inland so they could build a dam on their land. They refused to go. Living and making their life by the river was what they knew. First they came for the men and a month later the women and children. More than 440 Maya Achi were killed in the village of Río Negro alone, and the string of extra-judicial killings that claimed up to 5,000 lives between 1980 and 1982 became known as the Río Negro Massacres. The government officially declared the acts to be counterinsurgency activities - although local church workers, journalists and the survivors of Rio Negro deny that the town ever saw any organized guerilla activity.
We will hike the Memory Trail with Sabastian, our guide and a survivor. (8 KM). On the trail, called Pakoxom in Achi - The Sun Rises again in we trace the footsteps of the women and children who were killed in the massacre of March 13, 1982.
We will spend a few days with the community where they have re-built and live once again. The landscape is exquisite.

Coatepeque: A Voyage from the Heart: Until recently, the children of La Union, Coatepeque didn't have a school to go to. Now, their elementary school is packed and the middle school is just in its infancy. Located in the coffee growing west, Coatepeque inherited a poverty borne of agro-export, under-development and politics that never seemed to help. While there you will help in a computer class, run soccer clinics, help an English teacher teach small children and bring Canadian culture for a couple of days to some very receptive children.

Type of Programs

• Community Service / Volunteerism
• Cultural Exploration
• Student Tours
• High School Study Abroad

Languages

• English

Cost in US$:

USD4,800

Program Fees Include:

* Air fare
* Hotel
* All meals
* All credit courses
* All transfers
* All park entrance fees

This Program is open to

Worldwide Participants.

Participants Travel

in Groups

Typically Participants Work

in Groups of 10

Application Process Involves

• In-Person Interview when Feasible
• Online Application plus Application Assessment
• Phone/Video Interview

Typically The Application Process Time is

10 days

High School Unplugged's Mission Statement

High School Unplugged is committed to introducing young adults in high school to Guatemalan culture and the Mayan civilization. Our trips are transformational learning experiences that shows kids that they can be agents of change. High School Unplugged honours diversity and fosters an understanding of culture that connects the student, as a learner to multiple ways of knowing and understanding within a context of history, social justice, the environment and science. High School Unplugged courses also give back and service learning is part of the whole experience. Volunteer hours are awarded. Credits are granted after the successful completion of tests, assignments and a final examination. 110 course hours must be completed to satisfy Ontario Ministry of Education standards.

Year Founded

2009