Volunteers in Teesto, Arizona, for the Caltech Y’s Alternative Spring Break in 1996.

Spring break offers more than fun

Virtually every year since 1996, the Caltech Y has sponsored an Alternative Spring Break (ASB) program for students as well as other members of the Caltech community. The goal is for students to venture beyond academic concerns in Pasadena and enjoy learning through direct experience in other places for a week, volunteering for a variety of service projects. (“Explore a new place, experience a new culture, serve a community, meet new friends and have fun,” suggests the Caltech Y’s website.)

“The first trip that we did was in Teesto, Arizona,” says Athena Castro, executive director of the Caltech Y. Students worked at a community center on the Navajo reservation. “There had been programs during the Y’s history where we took students to do community service in Tijuana and other places, but nothing comprehensive.”

In later years, ASB travelled to such places as Tecolote, Mexico, and Bluff, Utah. Locations are typically chosen using various criteria. Castro explains that the selected sites address a combination of issues considered important or relevant. ”We started to do the Navajo reservation because that was where there was student interest, and the students felt like they were going away and learning about something they didn’t know about. In the last year or so,” she adds, “we have been moving more toward asking questions like, ‘Okay, if we want to do a more environmentally focused trip, where are the areas we could go?’ We also started traveling to San Francisco to address more urban issues, like homelessness and the HIV/AIDS community.”

For this year’s ASB, students will go to one of four different sites. Volunteer work will continue in Tecolote and San Francisco, while Santa Cruz Island and Owens Valley, California, will allow participants to address environmental issues and service.

“In addition to the hands-on service that the students will be doing,” Castro explains, “there is an education component; we hope to personally gain as much as we give on these trips. We have speakers coming and the students will be visiting new places, so it’s just as much an educational trip as it is a service.”

According to Greg Fletcher, the Y’s student activities director, about 45 people (mostly students) will be involved in this year’s ASB, and the event’s popularity has already inspired an additional volunteer trip to Costa Rica this summer. “So that will involve international service learning even more than, say, Tijuana,” Castro says. “The ASB and summer trips have similar goals but the summer trip will be longer.” The intent is to provide more of an experience of cultural immersion.

Whether the Caltech Y offers more concentrated or expanded events for travel, service, and education, they are sure to continue providing memorable and meaningful opportunities for participants.
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