WILMINGTON, NC (WECT)
Ten local high school students returned after spending three weeks on a backcountry adventure in Alaska.
The students, whose families live at or below the Federal Poverty Level, were awarded a $25,000 Challenge Cost Share Program Grant by the National Park Service.
The funding supported the local non-profit group National Center for Outdoor and Adventure Education’s (NCOAE) 2017 Education without Walls (EWW) trip to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. The grant covered nearly all costs associated with the backcountry adventure.
While in Alaska, the students worked alongside a National Park Service archaeologist to clear brush and woody debris within the Chititu Historic Mining Landscape, where structures have been degraded by the encroaching forest and harsh weather.
The students’ mentor and leader Zac Adair, who was blinded in a car accident 12 years ago.
