If you want to be part of West Virginia Universitys service-learning adventure in Chile during winter break, you have until Thursday, Sept. 27, to apply for this unique travel experience.

Spanish-speaking skills arent required, but you will learn the language of leadership as you earn 6 credit hours toward your undergraduate or graduate degree.

The program is an integrated two-course unit that begins Oct. 2 and wraps next Feb. 12.

During the 18-day adventure through Patagonia, Chile, you will both learn and teach, according to Dr. Trace Gale, an assistant professor in WVU Extension Services Community, Economic and Workforce Development Program.

Preparation will include readings, discussions and two mini-adventures where you will test your skills through a GPS challenge in the Quebec Run Wild Area in Fayette County, Pa., and through a livelihood entrepreneurship sustainability challenge at the WVU Adventure West Virginia programs new high ropes challenge course in the WVU Forest in Coopers Rock State Forest, near Bruceton Mills.

Once you are prepared, Gale said that you will put your new skills to workThrough an extraordinary service-learning assignment that has been developed using the proven models and active partnership of Amizade Service Learning, Adventure West Virginia and the WVU Office of Civic Engagement.

You will work with Chilean tourism guides who are just beginning to establish themselves in entrepreneurial areas of outdoor adventure tourism. While they are helping you to refine and develop your technical skills in sea kayaking, fly-fishing, trekking, horseback riding, back-country cooking, outdoor leadership and risk management, you will be helping them to plan and prepare for leadership in their own entrepreneurial and livelihood activities.

Gale, whose doctoral studies explored Chiles economic development challenges and opportunities, said that the guides involved in this course have earned adventure guide certifications through their participation in a two-year program entitledThe Guides School of Patagonia.

Now, she said, they are eager to move their livelihood capacities to the next level: run successful entrepreneurial companies that celebrate and preserve their lands beauty and their peoples culture. Her course will provide a special opportunity for mutual learning, cultural exchange and service.

When you return from your travels, you will finish the course with a capstone project that will give you the opportunity to apply your livelihood entrepreneurship skills in West Virginia.

The project will involve collaborative development of a detailed strategy for a new statewide program that will enable West Virginia communities to develop, leverage and sustain resources that are readily available to them in ways that will enhance their health, livelihoods, economic situations, environment and overall quality of life.

You will create the West Virginia strategy during a final weekend retreat with The Mountain Institute at the Spruce Knob Mountain Center in Pendleton County.

The Mountain Institute is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, DC, with offices and community-based programs in the Andean, Appalachian and Himalayan mountain ranges. The institutes mission involves partnering with local people to strengthen their communities and to conserve their natural resources and cultural heritage.

Along with WVU Extension Service, Adventure West Virginia and the WVU Center for Civic Engagement, The Mountain Institute will be an important partner in moving the strategy you develop forward in the year to come.

Gale, who createdLivelihood Entrepreneurialism Leadership Studies in Patagonia, Chile,said students will receive one grade for the two-course program. She will be instructing and leading the course along with Forrest Schwartz and Greg Corio, both of the WVU Adventure West Virginia Program.

Credit is available through programs within the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, the College of Business and Economics, and the Davis College of Agriculture, Forestry and Consumer Sciences.

Students from any college or university in the United States or abroad can participate, receive credits from WVU and arrange for a transfer of credits to their home university. See the Amizade Web site for details (www.amizade.org/).

To receive more information or an application, visit the Web (www.globalservicelearning.org/winter_break_07/chile.html).

You may also contact Trace Gale ( TEGale@mail.wvu.edu ) or Forrest Schwartz ( Forrest.Schwartz@mail.wvu.edu ) with questions.