This program takes students to South Africa to experience one of the most dynamic, influential, and complex countries on the continent. Throughout our travels, students will explore the long, arduous path that the country traversed before finally achieving majority rule in 1994, but also of the formidable political, social, and economic challenges that remain as South Africa continues to develop. Students will begin at Kruger National Park to view Africa's unparalleled wildlife and then travel to Cape Town, one of the world's most beautiful and exciting cities, for the duration of our time in the country. Students will also consider how South Africans currently engage with the long period of apartheid that the country experienced and the contested ways this past is both remembered and memorialized by engaging with South African students and activists through collaborative service learning activities. At every turn, students will take advantage of their presence in the country to engage in experiential learning, deepening their understanding and appreciation of South Africa's rich culture and history, superb cuisine, and remarkable physical beauty, as each student learns about the nation and its diverse peoples. Every country in the world displays some diversity, but South Africa, stretching from the hippos in the Limpopo River to the penguins waddling on the Cape, takes some beating. It befits its position at the southern end of the world’s most epic continent, with more types of terrain than photographers can shake their zoom lens at. There’s the deserted Kalahari, Namakwa’s springtime symphony of wildflowers, iconic Table Mountain and Cape Point, Kruger National Park’s wildlife-stalked savannah (scene of the famous lion-buffalo-crocodile battle watched more than 75 million times on YouTube) and, running through the east of the country and into Lesotho, the Drakensberg. KwaZulu-Natal’s iSimangaliso Wetland Park alone has five distinct ecosystems, attracting both zebras and dolphins.
