College Expeditions

Alaska Endeavour -- in partnership with the Institute for Field Research -- runs 12-day expeditions for college students (18 or more years old) led by an accomplished professor or other researcher. The mission of each expedition is specific and different and they change every season. It could be volcanoes in the Aleutians, birds on Afognak, bears in Katmai, walruses in the Bering Sea, fossils on the Lost Coast, or something else entirely.

Each expedition has a week-long online class before boarding the Endeavour for the field work. Students earn college credits for the expedition.

As with our other student expeditions, students in teams of two are responsible for specific tasks: galley duty (cooking and cleanup), deck duty (fenders, lines, maintenance), and watch duty (weather and tide check, helm watch, and logbook). The teams rotate through the different duties every three days.

Students sign up online with the Institute for Field Research.

Our college expeditions for the 2025 season are:

Ornithology of Coronation Island

Explore the birds and other wildlife (whales, sea lions, otters, bears) on a remote and uninhabited island off the Alaskan coast. Weather permitting, we’ll venture offshore to document the rarely visited Hazy Islands, an important nesting ground for seabirds. This is a fantastic opportunity for any ornithologist and photographer.

Onboard: July 17- Jul 28
Faculty: Dr. David P. Craig, Willamette University
Credits: 6 semester (12 quarter)

Flights are to and from Wrangell (on Alaska Airlines).

John Muir in Alaska

Join this expedition reading John Muir (and other nature writers) while roughly tracing Muir’s routes in the inside passage of his in 1879, 1880, and 1890 travels. We’ll visit the same glaciers and see bears, whales, salmon, and old-growth forests. This is an extraordinary opportunity for any nature writer.

Onboard: July 1- Jul 12
Faculty: Dr. Tobias Menely, University of California Davis
Credits: 6 semester (12 quarter)

Flights are into Wrangell and out from Juneau (both Alaska Airlines).

Paleontology of Southeast Alaska

Dr. Murphey led our very successful Paleontology of the Lost Coast expedition last season. The fossils collected by the students are now being prepared for curation in the Museum of the North (Fairbanks) and are being identified by paleontologists at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, the University of Northern Colorado, and elsewhere. Join us for a fossil hunt this year on Dall Island and elsewhere in the archipelago.

Onboard: September 1- September 12
Faculty: Dr. Paul C. Murphey, CEO, Paleo Resource Specialists, and Research Associate at the San Diego Natural History Museum.
Credits: 6 semester (12 quarter)

Flights are into and out of Ketchikan (Alaska Airlines).