Students will engage the nations during spring break trips

From Central America to Europe and the Middle East, 174 Liberty University students will be traveling around the world during their spring break next week on eight international trips offered by LU Send, a division of the Office of Spiritual Development.

The 10-day trips range from humanitarian opportunities and cultural engagement to academic enrichment.

On Thursday morning, students checked in at a parking lot on East Campus for a send-off event, where they were greeted with Chick-Fil-A breakfast. Staff members made sure all the passports and travel documents were in order before students loaded onto five buses where leaders prayed with their groups before heading to the airports.

“We were so excited to watch 174 Champions for Christ being sent out into the world,” LU Send Trip Coordinator Weston Martin said. “We are so excited to see our students embrace their academics in a way that stretches far beyond the borders of the U.S. and engages with foreign cultures and peoples. We know that the light of Christ is heading forth into the world this spring break.”

Students will return the weekend before classes resume on Monday, March 20.

LU Send trips, Spring Break 2017

• Guatemala: American Sign Language students will be working at a boarding school for the deaf in Jutiapa.
• Ukraine: Students from the Department of Counselor Education and Family Studies will be working with Last Bell Ministries, which works to love and restore orphans and abuse victims.
• Israel: For Purim, the Jewish holiday that celebrates the defeat of Haman’s plot to kill the Jews, a team of students will partner with This Beautiful Land Initiative to clean up trash along the coast of the Dead Sea. They will also meet with Holocaust survivors and visit biblical sites such as the Garden of Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives, and the Western Wall tunnels.
• Belgium: While in Brussels, Theatre Arts students will perform the play “American Tall Tales” at the NATO base, as well as give local street performances. The team will also travel to Paris.
• Ireland/England: Students will celebrate Irish heritage in Dublin before St. Patrick’s Day, where they will be visiting St. Patrick’s Cathedral. They will also visit London and tour the Shakespeare’s Globe and the Tower of London.
• Germany, France, and Switzerland: To honor the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, students from the Department of History and the School of Divinity will spend the week following in the footsteps of those who have influenced modern Christianity. Highlights of the trip include visits to the Topography of Terror Museum in Berlin (headquarters during the Nazi regime), as well as the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and the Reformation Wall in Geneva, Switzerland. They will also work with refugees.