The Alternative Spring Break co-ordinators at Western will be offering an alternative, Alternative Spring Break in May.

Three of the eight scheduled trips last month were cancelled due to poor weather conditions. The participants of the cancelled expeditions were en route to Costa Rica, Peru and Nicaragua.

“It’s been extremely disappointing for both the students and the co-ordinators to have three trips cancelled,” Stephanie Hayne, experiential education co-ordinator for ASB, said. “We are very committed to finding alternative options for students and have been working with our community partners for the last couple weeks.”

The ASB coordinators received responses from students who will be able to attend a rescheduled trip in May; however, this may not be a feasible option for all students.

“We recognize that, because of prior commitments, some participants won’t be able to take part, which is disappointing for them and for us,” Hayne said.

Students on the Costa Rica trip paid a $2,400 fee, which included the flight cost, insurance, airport bus, team t-shirt, team leader contribution, registration fee, meals, accommodations and transportation.

“We are working on details of the reimbursement,” Hayne said. “Our concern is getting students back as much money as we can while recognizing that our community partners spent [the] majority of their registration fee preparing for their trips in February.”

Students scheduled for the ASB Costa Rica trip took a bus from Elgin Hall to the Detroit airport. Upon their arrival at 3 a.m., they found out their flight was cancelled due to a snowstorm.

Alisha Somji, a second-year health sciences student on the Costa Rica trip, spent the day sleeping on the airport floor and waiting to find out if their flight could be rescheduled.

“They were looking for other airlines to switch us on but it was difficult because we were travelling as a group,” Somji said.

“There was a lot of buildup for the trip. Everyone was really excited,” Somji said, adding preparations for the trip included four-hour meetings every Sunday as well as taking various medications.

Somji is able to attend the trip in May, as it is scheduled the week before intersession begins; however, she is required to pay an additional $100 to cover rescheduling fees.

“Our main concern was not being able to help out the medical clinics in Costa Rica. We weren’t as concerned about the money we may lose,” Somji added.

The ASB is in its eighth year of the program, yet organizers have never faced this problem before.

“We work really hard to manage logistics,” Hayne said. “This was a new challenge for us and we were just as disappointed as the students after all these months of preparation and training.”

“It’s a risk you have to take when you travel. We can’t always predict when weather will become a problem and we can’t really prepare for it happening again in the future either.”