A Boulder company that offers educational trips to Africa, Asia and Latin America is gaining international attention following the reveal of Malia Obama’s secret trip to Bolivia and Peru late last year.
The elder daughter of former President Barack Obama participated in a 83-day gap year program organized by Boulder-based , last week.
A photo from Bolivian Mountain Guides shows Malia Obama hiking in Bolivia’s Cordillera Real mountain range with a group of young people.
Reed Harwood, executive director of Where There Be Dragons, declined to comment this week on individual program participants, citing student privacy.
But the company has a long history of offering what Harwood described as “cross-cultural experiential education.”
Founded in 1993, Dragons has worked with more than 6,000 participants in often remote areas over the years, offering travel experiences ranging from four-week summer programs to three-month gap year and college study abroad programs.
“They are transformative programs. Students have an experience of a different way of living life,” Harwood said in an interview. “We go to communities and places that are far from what students are accustomed to, and it challenges them to think about who they are and what their values are in a different way.”
Inspired by founder Chris Yager’s own , the first Dragons trips in the early 1990s were to previously closed areas of western China and the Tibetan Plateau. Current program destinations include Guatemala, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Nepal, Nicaragua, Rwanda, Madagascar and Jordan.
Dragons also partners with schools looking for support running their own study abroad programs. That list includes Through the tuition-free program, incoming Princeton freshmen can defer enrollment and spend nine months engaging in community service in Bolivia, Brazil, China, India or Senegal.
Locally, Dragons works with Naropa University, Colorado Academy, Vail Mountain School and Watershed School, according to its website.
The that Malia Obama participated in, according to The Times, includes an extended home-stay in a small agricultural community in central Bolivia, rugged treks and intensive Spanish language courses as students “examine social movements and environmental conservation efforts in the mountains and jungles of Bolivia and Peru.” No two trips are exactly alike, according to the website.
Obama, 18, to take a gap year. Her plans for the year also include a forthcoming internship in the .
