AirBnb To Train Volunteers For Science Research Sabbatical

Airbnb is offering a handful of people concerned about the environment a chance to participate in scientific research on how to help preserve it during an all-expense-paid trip to Antarctica.

- 

The Antarctic Sabbatical, as the travel company is dubbing it, will give five people the opportunity to study how widely microplastics have infiltrated the region. Over a month’s time in December, they’ll be trained in lab work in Chile, collect snow samples in Antarctica, climb key glaciers and even visit the South Pole.

Scientist Kirstie Jones-Williams, who will be helping to train and guide the volunteer researchers, says the goal of the program isn’t to create more scientists, but more so global ambassadors on the dangers of pollution and more.

“The science itself that we’re doing isn’t enough,” she told The Associated Press in a recent interview. “Actually, one of the biggest threats to our sort of natural environment isn’t necessarily the lack of information that we have ... but it’s more the disenfranchisement that can occur with policymakers and apathy and eco-fatigue.

“One of the main things is to get a bunch of people that can take the messages that we learn back to their respective countries,” she said.