Travel

Educational Travel

Educational travel is a key component of the SYA experience, providing opportunities for engagement in the host country, academic learning, cultural enrichment, and personal discovery and growth. You'll travel not as a tourist, but as a resident of the host country in which you live. At SYA, you'll travel as a whole school and in smaller faculty-led groups. Travel is a transformative experience, providing a lens through which you can better understand yourself, your host family and adopted community in which you live, and the U.S. differently. Travel is also integrated into all aspects of the curriculum via multi-day trips, field trips to local museums and historical sites to observe what has been discussed in the classroom or as part of extracurricular activities, vacations and trips with host families, and independent travel.

To this end, each SYA school includes travel as a required component of the curriculum. SYA travel includes both large and small group travel, and all SYA school trips are staffed by faculty to promote safety conditions for all participants. As a required part of the curriculum, all school travel is included in tuition.

Mia's Favorite Trip in Italy

Lilyana's Favorite Trip at SYA Spain

SYA's Educational Travel opportunities vary each year.

Check out recent trips and student reflections on their travels below:

Independent Travel

Independent travel is the opportunity to travel outside of your host city unaccompanied by host parents or SYA faculty. It can lead to a greater immersion in the host country culture, increased language proficiency and a furthering of the student’s educational goals. It is an earned privilege, not a right. Students who are in good academic standing, who are working toward mastery of the country’s host language, who are in good standing with the student’s host family and who have the ability to make healthy and appropriate decisions when engaged in independent activity may earn the privilege to travel independently, beginning in late November.

Ari's Independent Travel

Permission to travel independently requires the approval of the Resident Director, signed permission from Parents/Guardians and signed acknowledgement from the student of their responsibilities.