Do you find yourself interested in traveling, but have no idea where to start? This is a common problem when it comes to planning a trip, one that Taylor Lotte hopes to solve with Ravle, an online travel service she co-founded, that helps people experience personal growth through adventurous travel.
What makes this service stand apart from the rest—and what won it a Hunter Brooks Watson Memorial Fund grant—is its partnership with international filmmakers, allowing viewers to visualize their trip through professionally-made trip videos. These videos are then transformed into bookable travel experiences that any individual can enjoy.
Lotte, a junior at Syracuse University majoring in Creative Leadership, hopes to build and grow this travel business after graduation. Through Ravle, Lotte provides an outlet and source of income for travel videographers to showcase their work, and a site for those looking to travel. Viewers not only get a professionally-done inside look at a vacation spot, they also get to plan their own trips using the guidance offered by the adventure travel filmmakers.
Hunter Brooks Watson
The grant award is being made by the Hunter Brooks Watson Memorial Fund, a non-profit fund established by friends and colleagues in memory of Hunter Brooks Watson, a Syracuse student at the iSchool who tragically lost his life as a passenger in an automobile accident in 2016. Hunter demonstrated a strong gift and enthusiasm in music, computer technology, performance art and entrepreneurship. The students selected for these awards follow in that mold.
These competitive grants are awarded to students between the ages of 16 and 25, who have demonstrated a strong passion and interest in areas that can help benefit society today, but who lack the necessary funding to achieve their goals. The grants are awarded primarily in those areas in which Hunter Brooks Watson had worked, including music, performing arts, entrepreneurship and computer technology.
Ms. Lotte gained her love of the outdoors and adventure travel growing up in Boulder, Colorado. She will now be using this grant funding to expand the services her online travel site is currently offering, and to recruit and support more adventure travel filmmakers around the world.
More information about the Hunter Brooks Watson Memorial Fund and links for supporting the Fund’s unique projects, are available on its website at hunterwatson.org.
Story by Will Snape, Trinity College, Hunter Brooks Watson Scholarship Fund
Photo by Kevin Rieck, co-founder, Ravle