Students have the chance to travel to five states in eight days on a bus tour to learn about the civil rights movement.

“[The Civil Rights Bus Tour is] an experiential opportunity,” Director of the TCU Leadership Center Natasha Chapman said. “Students aren’t sitting in one of our seminars or workshops but are actually able to put their foot down where people actually stood, sat, protested or were arrested.”

The Center for Community Involvement and Service-Learning, Inclusiveness and Intercultural Services, TCU Leadership Center and the Department of History and Geography are teaming up to sponsor the trip.

“It’s a great collaboration of all the different campus units,” assistant professor of history Max Krochmal said.

The program’s goal is to provide students with an opportunity to learn about the civil rights legacy and social rights movements today, Chapman said.

“[The tour] is something you might not get in our campus culture…  and will help students expand their horizons,” Wyatt Kanyer, student representative for the tour, said.

Students will spend time with veterans and scholars along the way to learn about their motivation, challenges and strategies. Students should leave encouraged to take what they would learn and create change as leaders, Chapman said.

Since teaching a class on the civil rights movement and researching social movements, the trip was a logical extension, Krochmal said. We hope to learn outside of the classroom while empowering students to bring those values back to campus, he said.

The trip is not only visiting famous landmarks but an educational experience for all participants, Krochmal said. Learning about a critical time in our history is something all Americans should do, and the trip gives students the opportunity to do that, he said.

“I think there are a lot of positive things we can learn from our history even though it was a dark shadow in our history,” Chapman said.

Students will also stop in the impoverished Mississippi Delta to work with the Sunflower County Freedom Project, Chapman said. Children are the main focus of this service-orientated activity.

Nonprofit organizations are an avenue senior Spanish and journalism double major Kanyer said he would like to pursue after graduation. Working with nationally-recognized organizations and being educated in social change would be helpful, he said.

Participants will travel on a bus and sleep at YMCAs and YWCAs along the way, Krochmal said.

“These civil rights workers that were active made something like $5 a week and slept on plenty of floors, so we’ll get to experience that,” Krochmal said.

The trip is  open to all majors and all levels. The sponsors are hoping for around 20 students and five faculty and staff members to travel on the bus tour, Chapman said.

“It’s a great opportunity to travel inexpensively on a really moving and effective trip,” Kanyer said.

Students can register for the Civil Rights Bus Tour at involved.tcu.edu and e-mail Wyatt Kanyer at [email protected] for more information.

Civil Rights Bus Tour
When: Jan. 8 to 15
Who: Open to all majors and all levels
Cost: $75 per person (includes lodging, some meals and transportation)
          After Dec. 2, it will cost $100