Katie Armstrong, the Buckeyes Abroad North Queensland Sustaining Human Societies and the Natural Environment 2015 student blogger, writes:

My first week in Australia has been absolutely amazing. I cannot believe how much I have learned and experienced in just 7 days. I also can’t believe how close my group has already become and how well we know each other after only one week.

 One of the first things I noticed about our group was our diversity. I was worried that as a Business major I would have less experience with the Environmental Science material than the other students. However, the students in my group are from all sorts of majors including Business, Engineering and Early Childhood Education, the program is very inter-disciplinary! 

On top of our wide-range of interests, I’ve been amazed that everyone seems to be sincerely interested in what we are learning. We all genuinely enjoy going to lectures and field activities, in some cases we even like them more than our free time! 

Of course this is partly because our classes and activities are along the beautiful coast of Australia, but it is also because the course material is meaningful and interesting. I expected there to be a clear line between work and play on this trip, however the lectures, field activities and free time all merge together to create the total experience. I have fun during our class activities and I learn about the people and culture of Australia in my free time.

So far on this trip we have toured the Reef HQ Aquarium, and visited the turtle hospital. We also swam in a waterfall at Little Crystal Creek, down Running River Gorge and off of beaches on Magnetic Island. After all that we also found time to hike through the Wet Tropics of North Queensland to a beautiful look-out point and through a butterfly forest to reach a gorgeous beach. Words cannot describe how beautiful the Milky Way looks when walking along the beach!

I am less than one third of the way through my trip but I already know it will be one of the best experiences of my life. I still have so much still to look forward to, including snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef and holding a koala at Wildlife Habitat.