Aroostook eighth graders will explore the Allagash starting next year
By Chris Bouchard, The County Staff
ALLAGASH — Thanks to a new program, nearly a hundred St. John Valley students will experience Maine’s renowned Allagash every year.
Eighth graders in the region will embark on a three-night canoe expedition through the Allagash Wilderness Waterway as part of an initiative starting in 2026, approved by school districts representing Madawaska, Fort Kent, St. Agatha and Frenchville.
The expedition is part of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation’s “Youth on the Allagash” initiative, which since 2016 has provided more than 300 students with guided trips through the northern Maine wilderness.
The expansion celebrates the 10-year-anniversary of the youth expedition, and will bring nearly 100 students from three school districts in the St. John Valley to the Allagash every year. Maine has many programs to get youth outdoors, but none quite like this, organizers said.
Tom Gerard, a retired Madawaska Middle School science teacher and waterway foundation board member, said the school districts’ support speaks volumes.
YOUTH ON THE ALLAGASH — Students are pictured participating in the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation’s “Youth on the Allagash” program, which takes place on the 92-mile Allagash River in the northern Maine woods. As part of the program’s upcoming 10-year anniversary in 2026, it will begin including eighth graders from the St. John Valley region.
“This program gives our students not just a field trip,” he said, “but a formative, life-changing experience.”
The Allagash River became part of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System in 1970. The foundation, launched in 2011, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit consisting of volunteers dedicated to protecting and preserving the waterway.
Gerard worked as a Registered Maine Guide and began taking students on trips in the early 2010s. His first guide trip was actually for the Northern Forest Canoe Trail — a 740-mile paddling route that begins in Old Forge, New York, and ends in Fort Kent.
The foundation reached out to him to recruit kids for excursions along the Allagash River, he said. He was asked to become a board member in 2016, shortly after the organization began its Youth on the Allagash program.
The program also gives young people in the St. John Valley a look at potential career opportunities in Aroostook County..
“They don’t have to leave Aroostook County,” Gerard said. “They can stay up here. There are so many jobs within 100 miles north of Houlton, that they can enjoy a life up here if that’s what they want.”
Directors of SAD 27, based in Fort Kent, the Frenchville-based SAD 33 and the Madawaska School Department unanimously approved the initiative. The trip is now a part of each eighth grade student’s outdoor education.
EIGHTH GRADERS INCLUDED — Students participate in a past Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation’s “Youth on the Allagash” program, which takes place on the 92-mile Allagash River in the northern Maine woods. As part of the program’s upcoming 10-year anniversary in 2026, it will begin including eighth graders from the St. John Valley region.
The effort will give St. John Valley eighth graders in the Valley Unified Regional Service Center a chance to see an incredibly unique and remote part of the world in their backyards, Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation Executive Director Dan Dinsmore said.
“These students are used to being rural, but when you get out on the Allagash, you’re not around roads, you’re not around electrical lines, and you don’t see anybody else except for maybe other people on the river,” Dinsmore said. “It is literally being in the wilderness, and the students come back with a different sense of their world.”
The effort does not include the St. John Valley town of Van Buren, which is not part of Valley Unified. Dinsmore said the program is starting with schools in the Valley Unified region, but that he would be interested in including students from Van Buren and other towns such as Ashland in the future.
“Ultimately, we would love to extend all the way to Houlton and really embrace the entire County with this program,” he said. “It just depends on funds and capacity.”
The plan mirrors bipartisan legislation approved earlier this year that establishes the Outdoor School for All Maine Students Program, which provides fourth to eighth graders with immersive outdoor education opportunities, Dinsmore said.
A pilot trip will take place next June, and the program will be fully implemented in 2027. The expeditions will be led by guides from Chewonki, a Wiscasset-based environmental education organization that has been leading wilderness trips for the past century.
The students will camp in small groups along different sections of the river to ensure minimal environmental impact.
Dinsmore and Gerard said that while there are nature programs throughout the state in which students get an opportunity to explore the Maine wilderness, there is nothing quite like this three-day expedition.
“We hope there are more opportunities like this for students across the state, but in terms of three nights and two days on the Allagash, and the collaborative nature of going on the river, I don’t think there’s anything like it,” Dinsmore said.
The Allagash Wilderness Waterway stretches 92 miles and flows through the ancestral lands of the Wabanaki people who lived and fished in the area for thousands of years. While traversing it, students can study ecology and history, learn about the state’s logging heritage, and encounter wildlife, including moose and loons.
The foundation believes the program is incredibly important to the St. John Valley, and hopes they can sustain it for years to come, Dinsmore said.
“It is something, as a foundation, that is really meaningful for us to do — finding a way to give back to the St. John Valley and making sure that students and families in the St. John Valley fully realize how important the Allagash is,” he said.