It’s no surprise to anyone that retired science teacher Ernie Schiller is returning to Nepal in May.
Schiller, founder of the Rebuild Nepal Education Foundation, will be accompanied this year by two Fort Madison High School sophomores, Holden Fraise and Aiden Dostalek.
In total, 11 people will be making the journey this year. The group will be gone for three weeks, leaving May 23 and returning June 18.
Dostalek and Fraise will be getting some volunteer hours for their humanitarian and educational efforts in Nepal.
Fort Madison High School co-principal Adrian McKay said typically if a student is taking a trip of any kind outside of school breaks, “we just have to make sure that they’re all set with their classroom teachers to see if coursework is going to be an issue and they can go on their trip and not have to worry about academics back at home.”
The students said they have spoken with their teachers.
Schiller said when the trip was planned, the students were only going to miss about three days of school. But because of winter weather, the school year has been extended to June 5; the duo will miss nine days.
Fraise and Dostalek are friends and talked together about doing the Nepal trip before mentioning it to their families.
Holden’s father, Corey Fraise, said “From our perspective, he [Holden] just dropped it on us one day. We knew nothing about it.”
Holden Fraise said he felt the trip would be a good opportunity to learn about other perspectives of the world and how people live, “and it also gives us a chance to help out under-privileged kids in other countries.”
Dostalek said he was most excited to immerse himself in the Nepalese culture and see how they live.
A 2014 earthquake devastated Nepal, killing thousands.
Fraise said ever since, Schiller has been trying to help keep kids in school and make sure they’re getting educated.
“Most of the time, we’re going to different schools,” Fraise said, “trying to give away scholarships and school supplies so they’re able to continue.”
Dostalek and Fraise will be asked to teach a class, Fraise said.
“So we’re thinking about teaching small bits of engineering with Lego Technics sets, etc, so that’ll be the class me and Aiden teach,” he said. “And we’ll also be giving away backpacks and supplies, pencils, etc, to try to help them stay in school, as well as giving out scholarships so that their parents don’t have to pay for them to continue being in school.”
Corey Fraise he was excited for his son to go on his adventure.
“And also very proud that he’s taking the initiative to do this,” he said. “It wasn’t available when I was in school, so I don’t know that I would have had the nerve or the courage to actually do it myself anyhow. So I’m excited and proud for him.”
Holden Fraise and Dostalek had to get an updated tetanus vaccine as well as well as typhoid, and will be taking malaria pills.
Schiller said the plan is to leave Nepal before the monsoon season, which doesn’t start until July.
“However with global climate change,” he said, “their wet weather is increasing. Where you guys are going to go during the monsoon, on a slope like this, they get between 200-300 inches of rain a year. But with global climate change, the last couple years they had 700-900 inches of rain all within a six week period. But now it’s encroaching into June.
The group will have to adjust to Nepal’s much-higher altitude. Kathmandu, Schiller said, is a mile high and they’ll only go up from there.
“We take it easy the first couple of days when they arrive,” he said. “They will be going to some World UNESCO Heritage sites in Kathmandu. They’re going to get an education on the culture, because the culture is so different, because they’ve been around for 3-4,000 years.”
Dostalek and Fraise will be traveling 12,000 miles, Schiller said.
“The average Nepali will only circle about a mile if they’re lucky in their whole life,” he said.
Dostalek said he will be bringing a drone he built from scratch.
“Originally it was for a science project, which I did a few weeks ago. And so it also doubles as a camera drone,” he said. “You can put a GoPro on it and it’s very fast; it can go up to like 100 mph and it’s fully aerobatic. So it’s kind of like the stunt planes that you see. So it’s basically like putting a camera on one of those and you’re flying it around.”
Dostalek said he plans to make videos and use it as an educational tool for the kids.
Fraise said along with the video journals, he and Dostalek will be writing in journals as well, “so we’re able to recall this and show the experience and also help us with college applications when eventually that comes.”
Every person going on the trip are allowed to check two 50-pound bags, Schiller said. They can also bring a 23-pound carry-on and a 12-pound backpack.
“I tell everybody the 12 pounds, the 23 pounds is for you, the 100 pounds that are needed are for the kids,” he said. “Because we’re going to be putting 2,000 kids in school that can’t go. Right now we’re up to 10,000. So I’d like to add another 2,000. So each kid will get these backpacks.”
The large bags will be filled with school supplies, toys for the kids, some medical supplies, some clothing items and even some seeds for farmers.
The trip, including travel expenses in-country, the hiring of guides, an occasional hotel stay, and other expenses, comes to around $2,300. Airfare runs close to $2,000; for a total of around $4,300.
“So these kids have a lot of their own money or invested a lot to get there to volunteer to help,” Schiller said.
Schiller said in Nepal, “education is everything.”
“We think it’s important here; there it’s kind of the rule of the land. They want to go if they can afford it,” he said.
There is fundraising for the trip, but Dostalek and Fraise aren’t raising funds for their expenses; they’re raising money to buy educational and humanitarian supplies.
Those who wish to donate can visit www.rebuildnepaleducation.org/about and click the donate button.
