When Sacramento, California high school students Kathleen Snook and Kaneisha King (pictured) learned they had won a travel scholarship that would send them to Paris and Rome for six days and require them to extensively document their experience, both say they were stunned. "I've still not woken," says Kaneisha, 19, pinching her arm for emphasis over lunch at a cafe in Paris. Kathleen, 17, says it's been a dream of hers to travel to Europe with her family. "My Mom, brother and I were planning to come to Europe together to backpack once we had enough money. But now that I've been here, my Mom said, 'Well, now you know some good places to take us'".
Kaneisha, a fresh graduate, and Kathleen, who will be a senior in the fall, are students at a charter high school in Sacramento founded by the St. HOPE organization, which promotes academic excellence and intensive college preparation in inner-city schools. St. HOPE partnered with Context Travel, a tour company and foundation which has set itself apart for hiring highly specialized "docents" to lead their tours, to create the travel scholarship program. Now in its third year, the program awards high-achieving students who might not otherwise have the means and opportunities to travel to Europe and expand their grasp of foreign languages, history and culture.
The competition is fairly stiff: students at Sac High start competing for the scholarship toward the beginning of the school year, and are whirled through several rounds of interviews, writing and research tasks and other requirements. This year, St Hope and Context were able to select two students to travel to Paris and Rome; in past years only one scholarship was available. This is also the first year that Paris has been included in the program. Lily Heise, who runs Context's Paris office, says starting next year the competition will be opened to a charter school in New York City's Harlem district, also founded by St. HOPE.
Kaneisha and Kathleen are not on a leisurely vacation: the six-day program includes intensive seminars, classes and workshops and tours led by Context docents, most of whom are established scholars and experts in their fields. On top of these requirements, the young women are maintaining a regular blog documenting their trip, and are also working on separate, self-directed creative projects. Kaneisha says she'll soon publish an online magazine that will explore and compare the lives of teens in Europe and the US, and covering topics from fashion to art history. "One of our teachers has agreed to help with the page design", she adds. Kathleen, meanwhile, is producing a 20-minute video documenting her experience with the program, and says the video will be shown at a local Sacramento theater. "I've never worked with video before, but was really into taking photos," she says.
Both young women say the trip has convinced them that studying abroad will be a necessary part of their college experience. Kaneisha, who wants to major in forensic psychology and will be attending college in North Carolina this fall, is drawn to Italy and Egypt. Kathleen, a future History and International Relations major, says traveling as much as she can is the plan. "I wanna be a superhero, if that's an option," she says with a smile that suggests she means it.
Learn More: Context Foundation For Sustainable Travel
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Image: Context Foundation/St. Hope scholarship winners Kaneisha King and Kathleen Snook share an espresso in Rome. Courtesy of Context Travel.