{"id":157262,"date":"2023-09-21T11:42:54","date_gmt":"2023-09-21T15:42:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=157262"},"modified":"2023-09-25T10:06:27","modified_gmt":"2023-09-25T14:06:27","slug":"cool-comfortable-and-connected-to-bates-aesop-2023-is-in-the-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2023\/09\/21\/cool-comfortable-and-connected-to-bates-aesop-2023-is-in-the-books\/","title":{"rendered":"Cool, comfortable, and connected to Bates: AESOP delivers its promise to the Class of 2027"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On a recent early September afternoon, a spirited group of a dozen Bates students rambled along the Androscoggin Riverwalk in downtown Auburn, listening to music turned low on a hand-held bluetooth speaker carried by Alexis Gonzalez \u201926 of Hanford, Calif.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group had just come from nearby Crescent Beach in Auburn, where they threw a Frisbee, waded in Taylor Pond, and sang karaoke songs. Beside the edge of the rushing Androscoggin, they stopped for photos, while some danced. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just one day earlier, the nine first-year Bates students in the group were strangers. Now, as they enjoyed one of roughly 50 orientation trips offered to the entire Class of 2027, the strangers had accomplished what their trip leaders were working toward: creating their own sense of Bates community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2023
AESOP trip leader Alexis Gonzalez \u201926 of Hanford, Calif., tosses a Frisbee with a first-year student at Crescent Beach on Taylor Pond near campus. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey were able to really connect with each other,\u201d said Gonzalez, a co-leader of the Lakes Chillin\u2019 trip with J.J. Mariscal \u201926 of Mission, Texas. \u201cThey learned each other\u2019s names very fast. They\u2019re comfortable with each other.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the karaoke? \u201cThey\u2019re really good singers, actually. The energy was just really cool.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Outdoor orientation trips for first-year students are not unique to Bates, nor are they new. But in recent years, more has been done to hone and develop Bates\u2019 long-running program, known as AESOP (Annual Entering Student Orientation Program). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the late 1800s, for example, first-year students were welcomed to Bates with a bird walk and picnics. Then, through the mid-1900s, the Stanton Ride tradition took hold with a hike, picnic, and Bates stories told by beloved dean, Harry Rowe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the late 1980s, AESOP emerged as a multi-day, outdoor experience run by the student Outing Club. Similar to other colleges\u2019 programs, AESOP carried a strong outdoor-education component, with physical challenges in nature being a key part of the program\u2019s focus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
AESOP kicks off the day after students arrive on campus, when first-year students meet their trip leaders at a raucous kick-off costume party at the Keigwin Amphitheater. Decked out in Shrek<\/em>, Mount Blue trip leaders Verina Chatata \u201926 of Lilongwe, Malawi, and Eliza Dewey ’24 of Washington, D.C., announce their trip. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By the late 2010s, as Bates began to examine the totality of its diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, hard questions were asked about a predominantly white program at a predominantly white college engaged in a historically white activity, that being outdoor recreation, mostly in the backcountry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response, student leaders and Bates staff teamed up to make mission-driven changes, taking a deep dive into data from student surveys and national best practices to help them more effectively design an array of trips that adhere more closely to the AESOP goal: An inclusive and welcoming experience that gives first-year Bates students a sense of their place on campus, in Lewiston, and in Maine, and to help them feel an integral part of the Bates community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is a lot of experiential education research we\u2019ve looked at,\u201d said Blake Reilly, associate dean of students and director of operations and administration. A successful orientation trip is \u201cnot necessarily about an outdoor<\/em> experience, it\u2019s about having a shared experience and working together toward something.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ella Caron ’27 of Lewiston has the touch with a farm goat during an AESOP trip to Nezinscot Farm in nearby Turner. The sustainable farm is a popular spot for Bates community members. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

To that end, AESOP can\u2019t be one size fits all. Students should be able to choose whatever level of challenge they want, Reilly said, since many already have had their fair share of challenges just getting to Bates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAESOP should be challenge by choice,\u201d said Reilly. \u201cWhen students come to campus they are coming from all over the country and world, and some have never been to Maine before. If you’re dropped onto the Bates campus for the first time, you are already facing a challenging situation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AESOP offerings are more creative and varied than ever. While a range of trips still afford traditional outdoor excursions to the backcountry of Maine and New Hampshire (like backpacking in Grafton Notch or canoeing on Moosehead Lake), today about a third of the roughly 50 AESOP trips focus on some sort of city or campus experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One local trip gave students a chance to produce a film. Another explored downtown Lewiston landmarks. Another taught students woodworking skills in the theater department\u2019s scene shop, while Wool and Waves traveled to Popham Beach for surfside fun and knitting (no experience required).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"ASEOP
This year’s ASEOP head coordinators, Casey Shultis \u201924 of Portland, Ore., and Maeve McSloy \u201924 of Old Greenwich, Conn., pose outside Chase Hall, the staging area for the gear needed for this year\u2019s trips. (Their third coordinator, Faith Nwando of Queens, N.Y., is studying abroad this semester.) Working with college leaders, AESOP coordinators have restructured the program in recent years \u201cto make it inclusive for every Bates student, not just those who grew up participating in the outdoors,\u201d McSloy said.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Another major change is offering multiple versions of some trips for affinity groups: women, women of color, international students, and students who identify as BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, the Lakes Chillin\u2019 trip led by Gonzalez and Mariscal was a BIPOC student affinity trip. The two leaders didn\u2019t know they would be leading an affinity group until they were assigned one. When that happened, both said they wondered whether offering affinity groups might be limiting by preventing the first-year students from meeting students from more diverse backgrounds. But as they watched their group bond quickly, they saw the merit in this new option. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe kind of realized that the whole AESOP statement is about making sure students are feeling included in everything; making sure they have a safe and comfortable environment,\u201d Mariscal said. \u201cIntroducing them to Bates through a BIPOC group, they will have a strong connection with the group. And later on if they need someone to talk to, they\u2019ll always have someone they met in AESOP who they feel comfortable talking to.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Together, Gonzalez and Mariscal helped forge that strong connection. They planned a surprise birthday cake for one of the new students, and invited the first-years to contribute songs to a Spotify playlist. Within a day the playlist held 24 hours worth of music. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

About 50 miles to the northwest, AESOP trip leader Verina Chatata \u201926 was climbing a steep, rocky trail to the summit of 3,200-foot Mount Blue with deep breaths and a smile that stretched all the way back to last year, when Chatata climbed the same peak for the first time as a first-year at Bates with nine other women of color on an affinity trip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Ruby Forde ’24 of Atlanta and Pia Schultz ’24 of Saint Paul, Minn., announce their trip at the AESOP kickoff on Sept. 1, a women’s affinity outing to Acadia National Park. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The experience was positive and powerful because it leveled the field, Chatatas said, making it more inclusive and less intimidating. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI absolutely loved it. I liked hiking with the affinity group because it made the environment a lot more comfortable for me, even though I didn\u2019t have an incredible amount of hiking experience,\u201d said Chatata who is from Lilongwe, Malawi, in southeast Africa, and grew up camping, but not hiking. \u201cWe shared a certain level of understanding across the different conversations we were having, which thus contributed to the comfort level.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Catie Luedee works closely with AESOP student leaders as the college’s coordinator of outdoor education and programs. She also advises the Outing Club. The ability to be comfortable in the outdoors, she admits, was never a question for her growing up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe more I work in outdoor education, the more I think am so privileged: upper-middle class, white girl from small-town Maine. I\u2019ve always felt safe outside \u2014 my dad is a boat captain,\u201d said Luedee, who is from the coastal town of Phippsburg, an hour from campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRemembering that for a large population of people, the outdoors is not a place they feel safe is very important \u2014 and it\u2019s very important for AESOP.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The changes to the program seem to be working. By 2019, post-AESOP student surveys showed that 86 percent of respondents said the experience was \u201cenjoyable\u201d or \u201csomewhat enjoyable.\u201d  In 2021, after COVID canceled the 2020 trips, AESOP scored a 96-percent approval rating. Last year, it hit 99 percent. \u201cI was pretty happy with that,\u201d Reilly said, \u201cbut the goal is 100 percent.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
About 24 hours into their Bates experience, members of the Class of 2027 gather at the Keigwin Amphitheater on Sept. 1, 2023, where they will meet up with their AESOP trip leaders. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Another improvement added this year in the name of inclusion is a program to educate trip leaders about the history of the Indigenous lands they and their first-year students visited. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

During one of their many training sessions, AESOP trip leaders on Aug. 28 heard from Associate Professor of History Joe Hall, whose scholarly interests focus on Native American interactions with Europeans during the colonial period and who teaches a Short Term course on the history of the Wabanaki, the collective term for the Maliseet, Micmac, Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes in Maine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Students
Participants in an AESOP trip that did maintenance on the Appalachian Trail pose for a portrait after breaking for lunch atop the Bemis Mountain Second Peak on Sept. 3. 2023. (Theophil Syslo\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

During his talk to the more than 100 AESOP leaders, he played a video made by three students from his Short Term course that raised hard questions about what the students knew about Wabanaki history. Then Hall asked the trip leaders to ask themselves those same questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of the things that I want to have us think about is the way that outdoor experiences is not just going for a hike, which has all sorts of histories of really intense privilege rooted in that,\u201d Hall explained. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut those so-called classic experiences are rooted in a certain tradition of relatively rich white people enjoying the spaces that their ancestors had conquered from other people. And there are politics about who feels welcome where and what those spaces mean.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Mitchel Soederberg \u201925 of Bedford, N.H. who knew little about Indigenous lands in Maine, Hall\u2019s discussion \u201cplanted a seed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It just shocks me how little I know about\u2026 the history of the people who lived in this space,” said Soederberg, who helped lead the backpacking AESOP trip in the Bigelow Range. \u201cI love hiking and backpacking to these places. I want to learn about the people who (lived) in these places.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Four days later \u2014 following the traditional, raucous welcome to first-year students at the Keigwin Amphitheater \u2014 Soederberg and his fellow trip leaders gathered their first-year charges and fanned out across Maine and into New Hampshire to lead 57 trips. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the help of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, one AESOP trip offered new students a chance to engage with the Lewiston community to get a sense of the rich experiences that await them if they venture beyond campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2023
Tia Billimoria ’27 of Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Zain Ali ’27 of Lebanon, Ohio, talk with residents of a nearby assisted-living center during an AESOP-sponsored visit for board games and conversation. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the hope for these local community engagement trips,\u201d said Darby Ray, the center\u2019s director. \u201cThat they welcome students into the local community, expose them to the work of several local organizations, and give them an opportunity to get involved in that work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the AESOP community engagement trips this year went to the Montello Heights assisted living community, where the students played games with the residents, including one that revealed the cost of everyday things 70 to 80 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trip leader Gail Curtis \u201926 of Rockport, Maine, called it moving and unexpected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we learned is that service is not one-sided. We\u2019re also gaining something from the experience,\u201d Curtis said. \u201cThat really came to fruition right before our eyes when we went to Montello Heights because they gave us stories and advice from their lives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey said other Bates students have gone there and written their life stories. As an English major, that really resonated with me. That would be such an honor to write someone\u2019s life story to pass on to their children. We learned so much there. I just feel really lucky.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Outdoor orientation trips are not unique to Bates, nor are they new. But in recent years, more has been done make the beloved Bates program, AESOP, more welcoming to all students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1705,"featured_media":157263,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[130,31,32,224],"tags":[615,12324],"class_list":["post-157262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-collaboration","category-lewiston-auburn","category-maine-and-new-england","category-society-culture","tag-aesop","tag-class-of-2027"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1705"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157262"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":157381,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157262\/revisions\/157381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}