Students journey across America through UGA's Interdisciplinary Field Program

They travel through 20 states and to 23 national parks and monuments—including the Grand Canyon, Muir Woods, Mount Saint Helens, and Yellowstone National Park—and log nearly 12,000 miles on the road, and then tack on another 100 miles or so hiking on foot. 

For adventurous students, it’s a singular opportunity. 

“I’d never be able to do all this on my own no matter how hard I tried,” says Ava Macie, a second-year ecology major. “I couldn’t hit all these parks in an entire lifetime. This trip offered everything in one go.” 

The journey, however, is much more than a sightseeing road trip. A rotating cadre of UGA faculty and teaching assistants leads the program. And at every stop, the travelers get a lesson about the landscape, the environment, and the human aspects of their location. Piece by piece, they develop a more holistic sense of America’s natural world, its history, its society, and perhaps its future. 

Continue reading [and enjoy the video] about this amazing UGA experience.

Image: Students on the Interdisciplinary Field Program take detailed notes and sketches for lectures and excursions. The work in their notebooks becomes part of their grade in the course.