Winter Term Travel
Our Winter Term 2026 travel adventures offer engaging learning opportunities for GWA upper school students in New Zealand, Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Quito, Galápagos, and New York and Boston. Travelers will delve into culture, cuisine, arts, architecture, history, nature, science, technology and more during their excursions.
We’re excited to announce that all Winter Term 2026 trips have been reopened and will remain available until they are filled. If you missed the initial sign-up window, now is your chance to secure a spot!
Additionally, there is one final week to take advantage of the early registration discount, which will end on April 30. After that, regular pricing will apply.
Please note that each trip will close once it reaches its maximum capacity, which is determined by the number of assigned chaperones. So if you're interested, we encourage you to sign up as soon as possible.
If you have any questions or need assistance, feel free to reach out to Mrs. Suzy at squinlan@gwa.com.
For the domestic trip register at: https://www.explorica.com/sign-up.aspx
Boston & New York
TourCenter ID: Quinlan-8650
For international trips register at: https://www.educationaltravel.com/register
Learn About Our Partner Schools
St. Paul's School
Barcelona, Spain
George Walton Academy is proud to partner with St. Paul's School to provide engaging international exchange opportunities. Students from St. Paul's experience education in America as they spend several weeks at GWA, hosted by one of our school families. Students from these GWA host families then have the chance to travel to Barcelona where they spend several exciting and enriching weeks studying at St. Paul's School.
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Saint-Denis International School
Loches, France
George Walton Academy is proud to partner with Saint-Denis International School to provide engaging international and cultural exchange opportunities. Students from Saint-Denis experience education in America as they spend one month at GWA, hosted by one of our school families. Students from these GWA host families then have the opportunity to travel to Loches where they spend an exciting and enriching month studying abroad.
CEAM Mexico
Mexico City, Mexico
The student exchange program between George Walton Academy and CEAM (Centro Escolar de las Américas) in Mexico is a cultural and educational initiative designed to foster international understanding and collaboration. Through this program, middle school students from both schools have the opportunity to immerse themselves in a different culture, improve language skills, and gain global perspectives by participating in academic, social, and community activities during their stay. The exchange promotes friendship, mutual respect, and cross-cultural learning, enriching the educational experiences of all involved.
Extending the Reach of the GWA Mission
Part of George Walton Academy’s mission is to prepare students to become contributing citizens in a global society, both while they’re enrolled at GWA and in their lives beyond the classroom. The Global Studies Program allows our students to travel and serve, enhance self-development and awareness, and extend their knowledge and interests in global issues.
More Than Just A Destination
GWA’s global studies program provides upper school students a chance to travel abroad through exchanges and cultural immersions. But did you know that overnight travel is planned for GWA students as young as third grade? Our school’s mission promises to provide “challenging instruction, engaging experiences, and global perspectives”, and what better way to meet our mission than to provide those things in one experience?
Our students travel throughout the nation and the world in order to engage with our curriculum in ways that allow them to increase their knowledge through direct experiences while allowing space for observation and reflection. Learning doesn’t just happen within the four walls of our classrooms. Rather, we want students to understand real-world connections to what they have learned in class and we believe in the incredible power of taking students off campus as a means to transform the learning process.
Students currently in lower school are growing up into a world that will be vastly different from the one we currently occupy, and while we may not have an exact roadmap, we do know that we need to be scaffolding their educational journey with an abundance of experiences and opportunities to intentionally steep in deeper learning. Over the next few weeks, we will be exploring global studies through a series of articles and videos and addressing the importance of exposing our students to various educational methodologies in locations at home and abroad.
Main Objectives
GWA’s Global Studies Program is founded on four main objectives. Through intentional and diverse international travel, service, exchange and study, the Global Studies program seeks to accomplish the following:
Create opportunities through which students can learn to participate in a life without borders in an increasingly inter-reliant world.
Cultivate greater empathy within our students through global exposure and service-centered trips.
Foster 21st-century soft skills such as cultural literacy, cross-cultural competency and adaptability.
Establish long-term relationships with schools that are similar to GWA in the following areas:
Academic excellence
Global outlook
Character development
Socio-economic background
