Sustainable. For the Planet. For Communities. For Each Other.
Every member of the Educational Travel Collaborative is motivated by simple but powerful values - to benefit community members on both a local and global scale. This is the ethos of an adventurer - and one that fits beautifully into a world of youth travel.
One of the biggest intangible benefits of a career in education is the understanding that we make a living by improving the world around us. Educational Travel Collaborative was founded to carry that ethos into the travel world. It is our goal to support revolutionary adventure and exploration that reshapes the way various groups and communities see, engage with, and collaborate with one another for the better. Our belief in doing only good shapes everything we do - from our carbon-neutral operations, to the way we treat our clients, to the way we seek out and invest in partners.
Emissions Reduction. Carbon Neutrality.
It is easy to forget sometimes in the midsts of more acute crises, but climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions is the greatest crisis facing our planet today. Unfortunately, long-haul air travel is definitionally carbon intensive, and ground transportation tends to be powered by fossil fuels as well. We believe that the transformative impacts of travel done right are worth the costs - experiencing the diversity of our planet has shaped a great many conservationists, from Theodore Roosevelt, to Jane Goodall, to John Muir - but also that these costs must me contained and mitigated.
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Every trip we are a part of goes through an environmental impact audit - whether it is supporting independent travelers or the guided excursions we operate each summer. This allows us to:
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Route air travel with minimal emissions (differences in aircraft types can impact emissions per passenger-mile by more than 40%)
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Choose ground travel operators with a proven track record of operating sustainably
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Show our providers we are serious about working with the best in the business, and that this includes their maintenance of sustainability credentials
Additionally, we work with Europe's premier carbon auditing platform, Atmosfair, and the Gold Standard Carbon Marketplace to offset emissions created by our operations and the travel we sell, through the funding of projects that not only mitigate our emissions but promote multiple facets of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals.
Creating Value, Everywhere We Go
Sustainable travel isn't just about conventional energy sources, however - it's about ensuring that the culture we create is empowering and uplifting for both the traveler and local community of the countries and communities being visited. We work obsessively to select partners who create true, renewable economic and social progress in the countries in which we work - ensuring your travel dollars end up going towards meeting local needs, as opposed to an international corporate bottom line.
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At the end of the day - success for Educational Travel Collaborative is a world in which more young people engage more deeply with the world around them, positively impacting local communities as they travel, and creating connections that will improve our international world in the future.
Sustainable for our People
Diversity is a strength for any community, and ours is no different. Our experientially diverse team of educators and global leaders see the world through different lenses, both in terms of their lived realities and their academic expertise. Our collaborative working model allows us to spread out both workload and responsibility in a way that ensures our operations are sustainable in the long term - no small task for a group balancing demanding careers around the world. What this gives to our clients is a team with the time to know their goals and support them in a way that is unique to each client's needs. As educators - we are used to supporting the individual passions of everyone with whom we work - ETC allows us to bring that skill and focus to world travel.
We are extremely proud of the space we've created in the educational travel world! Let us show you why:
Our elite team of experienced educators and adventurers allows us to offer guided and independent travel opportunities with uniquely verifiable value, while meeting the highest standards for sustainability and safety. Wherever it is you want to explore in this world, we can help you get there, engage, and grow.
Have questions before hiring us? Let's set up a time to chat!
30 min