World Challenge

Sackville students and World Challenge

Sackville has been running World Challenge expeditions since 2005 with over 160 students having travelled to countries such as Zambia, Botswana, China, Ghana, Namibia, Madagascar, Brazil, Malawi, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania.

World Challenge is the largest schools’ expedition company in the world, sending over 9000 students overseas each year. World Challenge expeditions are based on an ethos of education through experience and challenge.

On the Sackville expeditions, students have trekked with the Maasai, built a mud walled school, stroked lions and cheetahs, relaxed on Copacabana beach, learnt to hunt with the San bushmen, slept under the stars alongside the Zambezi rapids, taught English to local school children, dune boarded, renovated an orphanage, cooked on open fires, visited the terracotta warriors, met tribal leaders, been soaked at Victoria Falls and Iguacu Falls, cleaned a Buddhist monastery, travelled in dugout canoes, bartered hard in markets, watched the sun rise from the top of a sand dune, climbed a 4321m mountain, bought a live goat, been whale watching and had food stolen by baboons, jackals and lemurs.

Feedback from students who have taken part has been incredible, many have called it a life changing experience and several have found that it has given them direction and focus towards their futures. World Challenge teaches the students many skills including  independence, maturity, determination, team work, personal responsibility, decision making, money management, resilience, self-confidence, problem solving, leadership, and of course the chance to make a group of close friends. Students who take part in World Challenge can gain a vast amount from it far beyond the cultural experience of visiting other countries.

Currently students in years 9, 11 and 12 are busy fundraising for their upcoming expeditions, with one imaginative project being the fashion show advertised here. Year 9s go to Sri Lanka at Easter 2017, year 11s go to Thailand, Laos, China and Vietnam in the summer of 2017, and year 12s go to India next summer.