Hawai'i, HI
Catch a flight OutdoorsField sites Sci., Engineering, & Tech
Spend 12 days learning about lava, microbes, tea, farming, and aquaculture on the beautiful Big Island of Hawai'i.
12 days travel at
$3,850 plus tuition
BISC 3800 / ENVS 3990
3 or 4 Credit Hours
Instructed by
Dr. Erik Hom
Priority Deadline
September 30, 2026
Travel Overview
Go beyond textbooks and lecture halls. Study USA’s travel courses combine academic learning with hands-on, real world experiences. Every class maximizes its unique location with immersive activities.
You’ll earn academic credit, apply what you’re learning directly to your surroundings, and engage in lively class experiences—all guided by Ole Miss faculty.
What You'll Learn
Participate in research about microbes associated with lava and with tea plants/tea fermentation. Participate in life and work on a tea farm, picking tea leaves, learning how to make tea, sampling the tea made, and learning how a farm ecosystem functions. Learning basic techniques/skills for cultivating microbes, isolating DNA, and DNA sequencing. Learn about aquaculture biotech from company scientists.
What You'll Do
- Discover tea forest ecology and collect samples at Big Island Tea.
- Stay within Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park at Kilauea Military Camp (KMC).
- Collaborate with students from University of Hawai'i Hilo and the Hawai'i Preparatory Academy in isolating microbes and DNA, and sequencing DNA.
All activities are tentative and subject to change depending on scheduling, booking availability, and course adjustments.
Meet Your Instructors
All Study USA courses are designed and led by Ole Miss faculty. Your instructor(s) will be your first point of contact during your travels and lead you through all the class experiences.
Dr. Erik Hom
Associate Professor
erik@olemiss.edu
I study microbes and their social lives: how they interact, persist, and evolve in community. Microbes are often unseen, but their impacts on our planet and on human/animal/plant health is profound. While microbes have gotten a bad rap for years as "germs", we now realize that they are on the whole more important and positive than most of us have ever realized, and we love to research how. I have taught this experiential learning field course in Hawai'i during UM's Winter Intersession since 2017, and Hawai'i is such a magical melting pot of cultures that's profoundly differently and yet familiar for us mainlanders, it's really a great place for students to experience life outside of Mississippi and study "abroad" in a safe and interesting way. Many students have expressed how positively impactful their time in Hawai'i has been, making it even more rewarding for me to lead the course each year.
“Not only did I learn about the biology and geology of Hawai'i, I learned a lot about myself... I realized I had more valuable strengths than I originally thought. I was able to be nicer to myself when I realized that most of the weaknesses that I see in myself, do not in fact inhibit my strengths.”
– Nellani S., Winter 2024 student
From the Field
