Our primary concern is the safety and health of our students and staff. We conduct thorough on-site student orientation programs, especially with respect to student health, safety, security, crime and other risk issues in the country of travel.

Prior to the start of each program, students receive country-specific health guidelines including required and recommended immunizations as specified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Local health issues are later reviewed with students during initial in-country program orientation and are monitored throughout the semester.

We provide quality home stays located in safe neighborhoods.  Home stay family members can provide precautionary advice to our students about local conditions.

Passage has crisis management and emergency evacuation plans in place, as well as a regularly drilled and tested system for promptly reaching students and their emergency contacts in a crisis.  All Passage students are required to register with their Embassy in Nepal.  Our utmost priority is the safety and security of our students.  Besides the US Embassy announcements, we follow the local news closely and, since we live and work in-country, have several reliable sources of unpublished news.  The coordinators and at least one of the directors will be available 24 hours a day in the event of a medical or other emergency.  In the extremely unlikely event that an evacuation is necessary, we can help make arrangements to ensure it happens as fast as possible.  Passage staff is well trained and knowledgeable in emergency procedures.

Total safety cannot, of course, be guaranteed abroad, just as it cannot be guaranteed in the United States.  Passage is committed to taking the necessary steps to maximize student safety at each and every program site.

Events may transpire that are reported by the media such that they are perceived by family members in the home country as a threat to the health and safety of program participants, but which may not be a real threat as assessed by Passage staff.  In many such cases, these events will be treated as a real emergency due to the need to respect the perception of an emergency until this perception can be corrected.

The Passage Risk Management Team consists of all Passage staff members – including staff on salary and contracted Program Coordinators, teachers and faculty, and home stay family members.  Each member of the team is assigned responsibilities for emergency response, and for ongoing preparedness for emergencies.