The Most Unique Year of College on the Planet

"Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual, not a conformist: it should furnish you with an original spirit with which to tackle the big challenges; it should allow you to find values which will be your road map through life; it should make you spiritually rich, a person who loves whatever you are doing, wherever you are, whomever you are with; it should teach you what is important, how to live and how to die."
- John Taylor Gatto

Study Abroad, Gap Year and Interim Learning Program

This 9-month program is tremendously varied, is designed to cultivate the whole person and includes:

a three-month experiential group semester of language, service and cultural immersion in India or South America,
a 12-week solo internship of your own choosing,
career and job-readiness counseling, a curriculum of Life Skills Learning, and
a formal Rite of Passage that also involves the parents.

The graphic below shows the linear progression of this alternative program "at a glance."

Leapyear at a glance, one year study abroad program

Note: Because we have packed so much into the program, it resists easy categorization - so please read patiently, so that you can get a full sense of our integrated approach to learning.

If you prefer, you can watch LEAPNOW Founder, Sam Bull, speak about the philosophy of LEAPYEAR (the same video that is embedded above) in addition to running through the year at a glance (embedded below).

You can also listen to a 20-minute interview (mp3) about LEAPYEAR, also with Sam Bull.

"Nine month, six countries, and more than enough experiences for a lifetime, it’s hard to believe my LEAPYEAR journey is coming to an end. The fact that my life journey is just beginning is even harder to believe. My accomplishments over the past year cannot be measured in the classroom. I have obtained a worldview, climbed a volcano, found love, SCUBA dived in Madagascar, learned a language, stood on pyramids, learned to live consciously, hugged a baobab tree, and the list goes on. I have been reborn a thousand times and I reflect that change. My connection with myself and everyone and everything else that exists in this world feels natural and true. My awareness of myself in this work has never felt so clear, so real, and so constant. Challenges and mistakes have become friends whom I love dearly. Integrity has become my source when I need balance. Questions have become my guide and answers have become stepping stones to bigger and more specific questions. Life is my journey, my journey has a purpose. I have discovered my personal legend; I have never felt so enthused to dive into the unknown."
- Kyle O’Brien, LYR 2007/08 Graduate (Group travel in Central America and solo internship in Madagascar)

AN INTRODUCTION TO LEAPYEAR

Mahatma Gandhi exhorted us with his actions and words to "be the change that you wish to see in the world."

How can you learn to "be the change" in an educational system that asks you to sit in a chair and learn passively for 16 years in a row - that is more dedicated to teaching conformity than teaching creative participation and individual transformation? Humans learn best by doing - by working actively in the outer world and by learning how to transform our inner worlds. LEAPYEAR is designed to be experiential and participatory - for people who realize that there is much more to life and learning than sitting passively in a classroom and letting educational "experts" talk AT us.

We grow in our own lives by facing successively greater challenges. We grow by surrounding ourselves with others who wish to grow and be challenged. We grow by taking time to lay down a solid foundation in our life based on integrity and alignment with our inner self. We grow by leaving home.

What is a LEAPYEAR: Study Abroad, Alternative College Education Program?

LEAPYEAR provides a strong and gentle container in which you can remember and embrace your life purpose, and challenges you to answer the call you are hearing, so that you can do what you came here to do. The investment of time, money and energy in your remaining three years of college make a lot more sense if you have a clear sense of your life purpose and if you have take time to explore your interests.

Between the ages of 17 and the early twenties, young adults are faced with THREE big and potentially difficult transitions:

from high school to college
from family to independence
and from adolescence into adulthood

This is when most people start grappling with the questions, "Who am I, really?" and, "What am I going to do with my life?" These fundamental questions arise with a sense of urgency, with a strong need to know. This is when we begin to understand our life is our own - WE have to take the tiller of our own life, and determine which direction we will go.

Why Gap Year and LEAPNOW Study Abroad Education Programs Lays the Foundation for Today's Teens and Adolescents.

If you take the time to wrestle with these questions and find some answers, you can lay the foundation of a life worth living - one of creativity, fulfillment, and integrity. If, like most people, you choose to follow the herd to college for four more years of classroom schooling, you might continue to live an unexamined life - choosing to defer real inquiry into what you are made of. If you do so, you replace your family with another institution that houses and feeds you, and that generally limits how you learn to a classroom. Private college now costs over $1000 per WEEK. If one does not have a compelling reason to be there, it can be a tremendous waste of time and money. Indeed, many people end up using their freshman year as a year off! We hear more and more students express the sentiment that they don't want to waste their money or their parents' money by going to college without a plan or a purpose. Students who go to college without a clear sense of inner purpose are often afflicted by "sophomore slump" when they have to choose a major but have no real life experience to inform their choice.

A better alternative to 16 uninterrupted years in the classroom is to take time to explore - real exploration that leads to life experience, perspective, and the beginnings of wisdom - time to engage the world in a genuine way reflecting our individual interests - rather than continuing in a contrived learning situation. Life is NOT a race, and there is inner work that needs to be done at this time in order to grow up. To do this work we need time, and we need experiences that allow us to take the measure of ourselves - LEAPYEAR is specifically designed to provide "the right stuff" for this passage. The year contains both formal and informal rites of passage - a vital necessity in a society that does not give its youth markers for the journey into adulthood.

LEAPYEAR gives you study abroad college credits, group travel, individual internships, and transformative teachings.

This all-in-one program, is a way for people between the ages of 17 and 22 to get what they need to make a graceful and powerful transition into creative, independent adulthood. LEAPYEAR is the longest, most challenging and most personal program that LEAPNOW offers. It provides a full palette of physical, mental, social, spiritual and cultural challenges. It would be very hard to complete the program without becoming a well-rounded and mature individual. At the end of a LEAPYEAR most students have the emotional literacy of people who are a decade older.

Gap Year for College, Independent Study or High School Completion - a 9 Month Program

The program is used by most students as a first or second year of college, but it can also function as a for-credit gap year between high school and college. At least 6 past LEAPYEAR students have used the program as independent study for high school completion.

A CLOSER LOOK AT THE 2010-11 LEAPYEAR PROGRAM

"Education takes place when the spirit and soul are engaged and involved."
- Michael Meade

The next LEAPYEAR program starts in the fall of 2010 - our 16th LEAPYEAR group. The group, called Pegasus, starts on the 7th of September and runs through May 14th, 2011. Each LEAPYEAR group of 24-32 students will travel as a group throughout their LEAPYEAR journey, but during the Fall Semester will split into two-three small groups of 10-12 students. In Pegasus, these smaller groups will travel to India or South America. During the second semester internship months, participants travel on their own. Full dates on our logistics page. A full year of college credit is earned by each participant.

START OF THE LEAPYEAR PROGRAM - RETREAT WEEKS (8 weeks)
It all begins at LEAPNOW's Northern California campus. These weeks are the backbone of the program - and the foundation for all further worldwide exploration. The focus is on working with peers to learn vital life skills, undergo rites of passage, enhance emotional literacy, and build supportive community. Each day includes at least one hour of a physical discipline (yoga, t'ai chi, dance), four hours of work, free time, and 3-6 hours of the living skills curriculum. Follow this link for more detail about the Living Skills Curriculum.

FIRST SEMESTER IN INDIA or SOUTH AMERICA (10 Weeks)
Each participant chooses between group travel in India or South America. In South America group members study Spanish, do environmental and construction work, and study sustainable living in Argentina, Bolivia & Peru. India participants do service work, study yoga, learn meditation, trek in the Himalayas, and learn Hindi or the Tibetan language. More about the Group Semesters in South America and India.

GOING HOME - The Journey & Curriculum continues!

There is a 7-8 week break after Thanksgiving during which students generally go home for the holidays, to work, or to do a short volunteer internship, or complete college applications. During this time, the program curriculum continues, as student prepare for the second half of the program, and because going home is such a rich experience after 10 weeks in India or South America!

RITE OF PASSAGE CEREMONY
The retreat weeks after the mid-year break culminate in a dramatic rite of passage into adulthood. One or both parents join the participants for two days to consciously let their son or daughter go into adulthood, while giving them their blessings.

SOLO INTERNATIONAL INTERNSHIP (12 Weeks) INTERNSHIP, APPRENTICESHIP, or VOLUNTEER WORK ABROAD
Following the rite of passage, participants travel on their own to study abroad, do an internship, apprenticeship, or volunteer work in a country of their choice. This builds on the first semester of group travel, and allows for tailored career or other exploration and language acquisition. Participants access LEAPNOW's database of hundreds of options to find a fitting internship. Read more about the Solo International Internship.

LAST WEEKS OF THE PROGRAM and GRADUATION
The final two weeks of the program are devoted to making transitions effectively, exploring the job market, re-entry to the larger world, endings, and program closure.

ONGOING SUPPORT, FOLLOW UP AND RESOURCES FOR ONE FULL YEAR
After the formal program ends, participants have access to a full year of life path counseling, a database of internships and jobs, and ongoing annual reunions. Program graduates are encouraged to return as interns with LEAPYEAR to assist future groups and deepen their own learning through teaching and service, or have access to a second year of guided internships in the U.S. and abroad.

LEAPYEAR is your experiential education alternative

"Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate the integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity to it, or it becomes the practice of freedom - the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of the world."
- Paulo Freire

What makes LEAPYEAR unique is the synthesis of so many valuable experiences and teachings - bringing together grounded life skills acquisition, rites of passage, group travel, individual internships and service work abroad, spiritual pilgrimage, and a curriculum focused on awareness and personal maturation.

What Sets LEAPYEAR APART?

LEAPYEAR takes the whole person into account - working with the body, the emotions, the mind and the spirit; providing an amazing crucible for a person to fundamentally change their life. Humans are slow learners, and a year gives them time enough to alter habits that may have been laid down over a decade or more. Not only is LEAPYEAR a place to deal with elevated topics such as life purpose, but it's also a place to write your first resume, learn to cook, and try on possible careers.
Many programs that purport to be transformative give you an experience, but then provide little or no follow up - it's as if you fall off the edge of the world when you are "done." You then have to work out how to integrate the experience on your own. LEAPYEAR gives graduates a full year of access to resources, counsel, and follow up workshops to insure that what is gained is retained, and built upon, and a 3-day reunion is available to all graduates at no cost every year in June.
Most programs and colleges claim to be committed to a substance-free experience - LEAPNOW is one of the few organizations we know about where this is taken seriously. We want our students to experience life without "additives" for a year, so they can have the experience of how glorious life can be. Parents give us the sacred trust of caring for their sons or daughters for a semester or a year - we don't believe that we can ensure their safety while traveling in foreign lands if they are using drugs or alcohol.

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LEAPNOW - Gap Year College Study Abroad
A unique Alternative Education Program for college credit - group travel - individual internships...