When you book a school trip with STC Expeditions, you can bank on getting a once-in-a-lifetime experience. You’ll also get a lot more behind-the-scenes support than you might expect.

At STC Expeditions, we want young people (and their teachers) to experience travel at its very best. To us, that means seeing extraordinary places, meeting inspiring people and doing new, previously unimagined things. As a small-but-perfectly-formed provider, every trip is personal to us. We only organise adventures that we’d love to go on ourselves. To make the process smooth and stress-free, we help you every step of the way – from the very earliest planning conversations to returning home. And you can trust us to dot all the ‘i’s and cross all the ‘t’s, too.

The STC Expeditions philosophy

The way we work and the trips we organise are guided by a few key principles:

Responsible tourism and travel expertise: we’re industry-leaders in responsible tourism, which covers everything from minimising our environmental impact to ensuring our in-country suppliers are paid fairly. Young travellers are passionate about understanding the footprints they leave behind, which is something we support and encourage. We’re also travel experts, with bags of first-hand experience and plenty of enthusiasm that we think you’ll find contagious.

Respectful travel: When we’re welcomed to a country by the local people, we conduct our visit on their terms and show our gratitude for their hospitality. We embrace, celebrate and are inquisitive about unique cultures, from which we always have something to learn. No one knows a destination like the locals, which is why every STC group is accompanied by an in-country guide who speaks the language, understands the culture and knows the terrain.

Value for money: We appreciate that a school expedition is a big outlay. To ensure that the opportunity is open to as many students as possible, we keep our prices as low as possible. Our activities are top quality and represent good value for money.

Remarkable adventures: STC Expeditions trips don’t come straight off the peg or follow over-trodden trails. We listen to your educational and self-development goals, and bake them into bespoke itineraries that give you everything you need and nothing you don’t. Whatever your area of academic focus, from religion to economics or geography, we can suggest a suitable destination, always with a view to including adventurous activities that challenge your students.

Serious safety: We believe in allowing youngsters to have an adventure, think for themselves and learn about risk, but that’s underpinned by solid safety, medical and crisis planning.

Fun vs not fun

When it comes to school expeditions, the teacher’s experience can be split into two parts: the fun bits and the really quite boring (but nonetheless essential) bits. If you’re the teacher in charge of expedition planning and organisation, the boring elements can sometimes threaten to overwhelm the fun. That’s why it’s well worth having STC Expeditions in your corner. We do a lot of the admin tasks and make sure all of the essential details are ticked off. That means:

working with you to design your ideal itinerary and providing materials to help you get buy-in
organising destination-specific safety plans and carrying out risk assessments
compiling info packs, FAQs and sign-up instructions
collecting passport numbers and ensuring passports are up to date
offering an online portal for easy registration and storage of participant info
completing medical clearances with an independent advisor and collating a comprehensive medical pack with individual cards and plans
issuing e-tickets and supplying visa info
providing ICE cards for students and emergency contact details for parents
organising comprehensive medical, repatriation and cancellation insurance
arranging 24-hour access to remote medical and crisis support

What comes as standard

When your students and their parents have signed up for an expedition and are raring to go, the last thing any of you wants is to stumble upon hidden costs. As well as giving you a fair deal, we also give you a transparent one. Your itinerary will detail exactly what’s covered and what’s extra. As standard, our prices include:

International flights

All accommodation, transportation and activities
All food
Local bilingual STC leader with a first-aid qualification
Launch presentation for students and parents
Pre-travel training programme
1-day offsite safety INSET day for school staff
ATOL financial protection
Emergency medical and repatriation Insurance
Group first-aid kit and prescription meds pack
BS 8848 safety-management framework and risk assessments
Detailed pre-departure information and kit lists
Comprehensive teacher travel packs
Permanent in-destination operations team
24-hour UK operational support whilst overseas
Donations to two carbon and conservation charities
Fairtrade t-shirt for every participant and teacher
Travel guidebook to your destination

To find out more about the service you can expect from STC Expedition, feel free to drop us a line or give us a call. We’re always on hand to talk you through what we offer.