Dubbed the “long tidal river” by the Indigenous peoples of southern New England who lived and traveled on it, the Connecticut River is the longest river in New England, stretching more than 400 miles from the northern tip of New Hampshire, through Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut on its way to Long Island Sound. For thousands of years, the Connecticut River’s resources have attracted inhabitants who have shaped the surrounding area in complex ways--sometimes for good, but often for ill. Today, the river flows in proximity to more than 2.4 million residents and over 400 communities, and many of us who call New England home consider it the most prominent ecological feature of our region. On this ten-day paddling trip, students and teachers will encounter the Connecticut River watershed, learn about its cultural and ecological histories, and begin to imagine how these stories can help map a better path forward through the challenges of the Anthropocene.

​

After a three-day orientation at Quimby Country Cottages in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom, the group will depart the river’s headwaters by canoe, paddling south until we arrive back at Loomis Chaffee--at home. This interdisciplinary learning expedition will include days spent paddling and learning and nights spent sleeping alongside the river. As we paddle, we will encounter the river firsthand, engaging with the complex narratives it tells. Our stops along the way will include prominent sites and conversations with local experts in art, geology, hydrology, and Indigenous history and culture. These experts will help us contemplate how a river creates a living place and how people have made a home beside it. By the time we pull our boats out of the water back on campus, we will have developed an intellectual, emotional, and embodied understanding of this watershed as both an ecological entity and a metaphor for something larger--a paradigm for living well in a place wherever we go.