Pelion School
Field research, exploration, and storytelling with communities around the world
The Pelion Education Model
Pelion is a two-year expeditionary research school for ages 17–19. Students spend 61 of 105 weeks in the field, learning with local communities and scholars, and graduate with an accredited high-school diploma, two transcripts, a defended thesis, and a portfolio of published work.
Exploration
Pelion travels by expedition, across ocean, mountain, forest and desert. Students learn to access inspiring places with technical skill, stewardship and reciprocity.
Research
Students learn through inquiry and comparative analysis, using the methods of the natural and human sciences, and Pelion’s integrated research platform, Humboldt AI.
Storytelling
Storytelling makes research and experience public, assessed for craft and impact. Students learn consent and perspective, and return their work to the communities who shaped it.
One curriculum, six expeditions.
Canada
Ancient Forests, Lifeways, and Stories. Forest and marine ecology, urban policy, and Indigenous governance, from Nootka to the Yukon. Track wolves and live off-grid with local knowledge keepers, then go solo in the wilderness.
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Nepal & India
Water security and the politics of development, from the Himalaya to Sahyadris. Glaciers, hydropower, and aid versus trade. Cross three 5000m passes, homestay with Sherpa hosts, train in wilderness fire and rescue, and intern with Mumbai start-ups.
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Japan
Philosophy, design, and technology, from the snow country to the subtropical Pacific. Avalanche science, an aging society, robotics, and satoyama. Ski-mountaineer Hokkaido's volcanoes, walk the Kumano Kodo, then freedive the Ogasawara Islands researching marine stewardship and endemic species.
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Namibia, Botswana & Tanzania
Water, wildlife, and community-based conservation, from the Skeleton Coast to Zanzibar. Desert ecology, the commons, and who shares conservation's benefits. Track rhino and pole a mokoro with local knowledge keepers, attempt Kilimanjaro, then research reef resilience freediving off Zanzibar.
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Chile & Argentina
Resources, geopolitics, and political economy, from lithium to Malbec. Extraction, water rights, and national memory. Freedive the Humboldt cove, overland the Puna de Atacama and attempt Aconcagua.
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Alaska, USA
Two years of cryosphere research completed on Denali; the thesis and portfolio defended in public. Attempt Denali, learn from Athabascan educators, then return to Vancouver Island to graduate and pass the flame.
Explore the term →Pelion moves through low-footprint expeditions, from the Pacific rainforests and Himalaya through Japan, the Skeleton and Swahili coasts, the Namib desert and Okavango Delta, the mountains of the Andes and Alaska. Local hosts share their knowledge and questions about living in place and adapting to change — water in the Khumbu and Namib, fires in BC and the Sahyadris — so students learn across places and whole systems, carrying what one place teaches into the next and sharing those lessons through story.
The Pelion Curriculum
- Pelion Core: A framework for understanding complex socio-ecological systems; the meta-cognitive capacity to transfer learning across biomes, cultures, and life contexts; and a personal theory of change grounded in lived experience and multiple ways of knowing.
- An accredited diploma, field credentials, a defended thesis and a portfolio of published work, alongside a conventional GPA.
- Standardized exams and assessments augment the Pelion Diploma in service of our students' individual goals, with academic coaching and college counseling.
