Fourteen students and speech teacher Harriet Clark will explore various cities in Italy and Greece from June 29 to July 14. Throughout the trip, the group will visit tourist destinations and participate in a global leadership summit with one topic in mind: the future of food. The summit, which will be held in Milan, Italy, will focus on solutions to the possibility of a global food shortage.

     “Our world keeps getting bigger and bigger with population, but shrinking as far as land to grow crops,” Clark said.

     Many of these students will be visiting these countries for the first time.

     “I’m very excited,” junior Jennifer Wloszek said. “I’m really looking forward to going there and learning about the culture. Who wouldn’t be excited?”

     The trip is sponsored by EF Educational Tours and attendance at the summit is at maximum capacity, as the event is sold out. The first five days, students will tour Greece and visit the Parthenon, Olympic Stadium, the temple of Olympian Zeus, the temple of Athena Nike and the temple of Poseidon. On the fifth day, students will fly to Rome and take a guided tour of the city, visiting the Colosseum and Vatican City. After this, they will travel to the Genoa region for two days. Throughout the trip, the group will take cooking classes and taste many types of food.

     “We get to go see the Vatican, so I’m excited to see the architecture there,” sophomore Prisha Grover said.

     During the final two days, students from all over the world will convene in Milan where they will take their experiences and put them into action to solve concerns about the future of food, including topics such as organic or nonorganic food, genetic modification and the use of preservatives. The keynote speakers will be celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain and writer and activist Raj Patel. The students then break into groups to create a presentation highlighting their proposed solutions.

     “I wanna have a different outlook on life when I come back from this trip,” junior Diana Leybin said. “I feel like we are fortunate enough to have food and water and necessities every day.”

     As well as having an opportunity to experience new culture and practice problem solving, students are offered college credit if they fill out a notebook throughout the trip.

     “I think this is going to be a life changer for them,” said Clark. “I think they’ll be my age and still say it’s a life changer.”