This is not your typical study abroad experience

For these 20 students, the IQP journey starts well before their travel to Bar Harbor—at the annual Global Fair held at the beginning of their sophomore year. There’s a lot to consider— location, projects, distance from home—but the attraction for many is the opportunity to work in a national park setting. Two terms later, following weeks of information gathering and application preparations, the students confirm Bar Harbor as their destination, and preparations get underway right away—they can't wait.

Arriving in Bar Harbor, the students feel prepared to tackle the problems they are presented and to navigate the landscape of the national park and the surrounding area, but they didn’t anticipate the obstacles and unknowns they would face. Team dynamics, vague and open-ended problems, human considerations: these are all challenges they conquered over the course of seven weeks. They gained an appreciation for real-world problem solving—and for the beauty of the national park and the park rangers who dedicate their lives to preserving it.