Teen Travel Program Wisconsin
We recently recorded a few short videos in which we share details about what teens can expect from the Beyond Akeela experience. The primary intended audience was campers who have already attended Camp Akeela. However, we think these videos will be helpful to anybody thinking about participating in Beyond Akeela.
LINK: Why Beyond Akeela Teen Travel Program?
Here’s a quick idea of what you’ll find on those videos …
What is Beyond Akeela?
It’s a great combination of a camp program, a teen tour, and a college prep experience! You’re first and foremost going to be part of a tight-knit camp community where you can expect to forge deep, meaningful friendships. Meanwhile, you’ll also practice post-secondary life skills through fun activities, and by traveling around the Midwest, including cities like Chicago and Madison, WI. Don’t worry, there aren’t any academic lessons that you’d find in a typical college prep program. This is still very much a camp experience!
Where will we stay?
Beyond Akeela has a home base at Lawrence University in Appleton, WI. You’ll live in the same dorm building as younger campers attending Camp Akeela, but in your own hall dedicated to you and your Beyond Akeela friends. Every camper shares a dorm room with another peer. It will really feel like living at college, except without any of the academic pressures of school. It’s really the best of both worlds: You get a camp experience filled with laughter, fun and friendship. At the same time, the city of Appleton and campus of Lawrence are great settings to practice post-secondary life skills in organic ways. Plus, it’s an ideal location for travelling to Lake Michigan, Chicago, and other nearby attractions.
What exactly will I do?
You can get a sense for a typical day and week at Beyond Akeela here:
LINK: Typical Experience at Beyond Akeela Teen Travel Program
You’ll eat meals with your friends every day. Breakfast will almost always be in the campus dining hall, which offers amazing food and tons of choices. After breakfast, you’ll start prepping for your day. A big part of Beyond Akeela is giving you a lot of independence and responsibility. For example, if the group is heading out of camp that day, you’re likely to have a choice about which destination you prefer. You might also help pack lunch or load the van for your trip.
Once the group is ready for the day, you’ll get started on your planned activities for the day. Those activities may be at camp, and they may also be outside of camp around Appleton. You’re also going to have a lot of choice with these activities. For example, community service is something you’ll do on multiple occasions with Beyond Akeela, AND you get to choose which service project you want to work on. Some of the activities you’ll do include: Camp choice activities, low and high ropes courses, health & wellness time, hike days, day trips to Lake Michigan and Madison, community service, scavenger hunts around Appleton among others.
Teen Travel Program Wisconsin | Autistic Teen Travel Program Wisconsin
Following afternoon activities, you’ll have some free time before dinner. During this time, you’ll have the opportunity to relax around the dorm. There is a nice lounge area that you and your friends can hang out in. You also can head to the campus health and wellness center for a quick workout if you want.
Dinner is an exciting time at Beyond Akeela because there will be days that you and your friends get to cook for the whole group! Of course, you’ll have lots of support from each other and staff members. You’ll plan out meals, grocery shop, and then prep the meals for the rest of the crew. In addition to being an important life skill, it’s a really nice feeling to cook and share meals with your friends! We won’t always cook of course. Some nights the group will eat at the campus dining hall and other evenings we’ll go out to eat at a local restaurant.
Evening activities will include nights out for things like bowling and a minor league baseball game. We’ll have relaxing choices like movie nights and game nights.
What about the trips?
You’ll also go on a couple different trips with Beyond Akeela. The first will be an Adventure Trip. You’ll spend a few nights under the stars camping and sharing stories around the campfire. S’mores galore. During the day, we’ll do some outdoor adventure activities like hiking, white water rafting, among others. You’ll also enjoy some more relaxing things like going to water parks.
The culminating trip of your Beyond Akeela experience will be what we call the “Big Trip”. You’ll make a couple stops on this trip. First stop is Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, a popular vacation destination in the Midwest. You’ll share a vacation home with your friends and your days will be spent exploring all that Lake Geneva has to offer. Days will follow a very similar structure to your time at camp. After Lake Geneva, you’ll head to Chicago for the last days of your trip! We’ll stay right downtown in a really nice private hostel called Hostelling International. You’ll share a private room with a few of your friends and a staff member. From aquariums and zoos to museums, walking tours of city and exploring with your friends, you’ll get to take in so much of the big city!
A large part of the Big Trip is that YOU and your peers are going to have your hands all over it. You’ll help plan out which activities the group does, how to get to different attractions, what you’ll eat when you’re there. You’re going to have a lot of control over the trip to make it the experience YOU want it to be.
Have more questions?
If you’d like to hear more about Beyond Akeela, don’t hesitate to call us any time: 866-680-4744. Thanks!
At Beyond Akeela we love to help encourage our travelers to develop personal skills that will help them throughout their lives. We never lose focus of our goal which is to help foster a learning environment that is fun and teaches many life skills that will help grow the Special Needs Teen Tour traveler’s life. Our Teen Tours focus on things like Increasing amounts of independence and responsibility, Wilderness opportunities that help campers learn more about who they are and all that they are capable of, real-world practice of planning & prioritizing, time management, organization, flexibility, task initiation, involvement and ownership of their own experience. Beyond Akeela provides special needs teens the opportunity to get out of their normal area for the summer and explore the world around them. It will enable them to prepare for life after high school. Many special needs teens who have traveled with us on a Beyond Akeela teen travel program are heading to college or a post-secondary program and need the practice in order to start off their young adult life successfully. Beyond Akeela’s Special Needs Teen Tour Travel Program is a chance for teens to become more independent. They learn to be more flexible as they travel from place to place. They learn important life skills such as food preparation (including menu planning, making a shopping list, shopping in a grocery store and finally, cooking a meal), laundry, budget planning, and setting an alarm to attend a morning meeting. Perhaps one of the most important things that our Teen Tours provide to our traveler’s is the opportunity to meet other teens from all over the country who share similar interests and life experiences. Teens Travelers with Beyond Akeela make life-long friends and form connections that make them feel valued and part of a community.
We started the Beyond Akeela program in 2011 and for its first three summers, it was quite different from the travel experience we’re offering now. At the time, participants lived at Akeela, our children’s summer camp in Vermont, for the full three and half week camp session (with the exception of a 5-day trip towards the end of the session.) It was kind of a hybrid between an oldest camper summer, a counselor-in-training program and post-secondary skills practice experience.
Developing Teen Social Skills is a very valuable and worthwhile investment. This is one of the many things that Beyond Akeela will do for your teen. Beyond Akeela’s Teenage Summer Camps helps to insure the best possible opportunities for success of your quirky teen.
