Liz Leonard '04 brings a new model to teen travel summer programs with her recently launched Blue Bridge Project, which emphasizes cooperation with local nonprofit organizations and self-reflection by student participants. The program's first five trips will set off to Madagascar, Nicaragua and Peru in summer 2013, according to Leonard.
Leonard said she became interested in teen travel programs and international development after she participated in a month-long service trip to Costa Rica while in high school. On the trip, she lived with a local family, worked on their farm, volunteered and practiced Spanish.
"I came back a completely transformed person," Leonard said. "Living with a family in that environment gave me a better sense of what the world looked like, which was very different from what I had experienced up to that point in my life."
Leonard said she wrote about the experience in her college personal statement, focusing on the power of the connection that she maintained with her host family after returning home. Upon matriculating at the College, Leonard felt compelled by the experience to take classes in international relations and Spanish.
"I continued to build on my experiences from high school in my time at Dartmouth," Leonard said. "I spent one of my off-terms back in Costa Rica, where I volunteered for three months. I loved living and traveling in different parts of the world."
Following graduation, Leonard co-led three summer travel programs for teens through Putney Student Travel, which offered programs structurally similar to her own trip to Costa Rica, she said. Leonard attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where she studied international relations and immigration law, and went on to work at Disability Rights Advocates in San Francisco.
Although she enjoyed the work, Leonard realized she was passionate about having her own travel business and identified flaws in existing programs that she wanted to address. As a result, the Blue Bridge Project is different from other teen programs in its partnership with local nonprofit organizations and its emphasis on student self-reflection.
"Partnering with local nonprofits ensures that the service projects we are working on are really important to the communities that live there," Leonard said. "In order to be part of systemic change, our work needs to be part of day-in, day-out work, like the local nonprofits are engaged in."
Students participating in her trips will be asked to participate in weekly reflections, and Blue Bridge will offer ongoing support services for students after their trips, Leonard said. Services might include advice on starting fundraisers to benefit nonprofit organizations or help with channeling experiences into college personal statements.
"We really want kids to build on their experience and apply it to what they are doing in the future," Leonard said. "Life shouldn't start up again in the same way after these trips."
Leonard faced many of the same challenges as other entrepreneurs, such as acquiring initial capital, raising awareness about the company's product and establishing timelines.
"There's been a really tight deadline to get all the material up online and distributed so that all the nuts and bolts are in order and we don't miss out on the recruiting season this winter," Leonard said. "Even the smaller details take a lot of time and energy."
Other aspects of launching the project, including establishing partnerships with local nonprofits, proved less challenging, Leonard said.
"Each time I approached a new nonprofit, they were so excited to hear about my new model for these trips," Leonard said. "I was worried they might not want high school students for volunteers because they don't have a lot of skills or they don't really need them, but it turned out to be the opposite."
Leonard recently visited the countries with which the Blue Bridge Project has paired in order to solidify regional contacts, she said.
Each of the five planned trips has a different focus, ranging from community service in Nicaragua to Amazon conservation in Peru and public health in Madagascar, she said. Lasting one month each, the trips will accept 15 high school students and a male and female trip leader. The trips cost between $4,000 and $5,000.
Lindsay Haut '14, who attended a Putney trip to Spain led by Leonard, said she remembers Leonard's passion for the experience.
"It was my first time in Spain my first time in Europe," Haut said. "[Leonard] was great at helping me navigate it and great about checking in during the home-stay portion of the trip."
Haut has stayed in contact with Leonard and said she believes the Blue Bridge Project's emphasis on student reflection and integration with local nonprofits are positive changes to existing teen trip models.
"I'm really optimistic for her," Haut said. "She's doing something based off of her passion that's off of the typical Dartmouth path. It's something people should really know about."
Isabel Hines '13 participated in one of Leonard's Putney trips to Nicaragua and credits the trip with sparking her interest in Latin American studies, which she is pursuing at the College. Hines said she plans to travel back to Nicaragua during the winter interim period to do community development work with Tucker's Cross Cultural and Education Service Program.
"The trip changed what I wanted to do with my life," Hines said. "As a leader, [Leonard] had to deal with a lot of unexpected things, and she was able to deal with everything with such poise. She's amazing."
