An alternative break program places teams of college students in communities to engage in community service and experiential learning during their summer, fall, winter, or spring breaks. Students perform short-term projects for community agencies and learn about issues such as literacy, poverty, racism, hunger, homelessness and the environment.

The objectives of an alternative break program are to involve college students in community-based service projects and to give students opportunities to learn about the problems faced by members of communities with whom they otherwise may have had little or no direct contact. Trips based out of the Tucker Foundation this spring included:

HABITAT FOR HUMANITY The Dartmouth Chapter of Habitat for Humanity ran its fourth year of Spring Break house-building trips. Two groups from Habitat spent their break working in Lynchberg and Danville, Virginia.

JAMAICA IMMERSION This student-led community service group traveled to work in Kingston, Jamaica for the third year. In Kingston, the students worked in a community clinic, tutored children in a primary school, and helped at a home for the elderly and homeless.

JACKSONVILLE HOMELESS SHELTER PROJECT This project sent Dartmouth students for a week of service at the I.M. Sulzbacher Homeless Shelter in Jacksonville Florida. Students participated in activities with the adult and child residents of the shelter.

NATIVE SERVICE TRIP This group of Dartmouth students who have a proven investment in Native American communities offered youth leadership workshops at the Navajo Nation Tohatchi Youth Center in Tohatchi, New Mexico.

COSTA RICA ENVIRONMENTAL AND COMMUNITY OUREACH Work projects for this group included construction of a kindergarten, and work in a school in a settlement of Nicaraguan refugees. There was also a one-day trip to a nearby indigenous reserve.

INNER CITY EXPERIENCE The Navigator Christian Fellowship offered an Alternative Spring Break project to learn about the needs of economically disadvantaged communities. The trip destination was Charleston, South Carolina working in schools and on building projects.