While many teenagers will be celebrating the end of their A-levels with a round of parties this summer, twin sisters Katie and Eliza Carroll will be trekking across mountains and through rainforests on a series of gruelling journeys to remote rural communities. The girls will each spend a month helping schools and orphanages in Thailand and Ecuador, learning new survival and life skills in the process. The 17-year-old twins, from Gilstead, are each aiming to raise £4,000 for their charity expeditions in July. Katie will be going to Thailand and Laos, while Eliza is heading for Ecuador.

Their trips have been organised through Bingley Grammar School, where they are pupils, and World Challenge, an international organisation which provides educational expeditions for young people, developing team and leadership skills.

Katie and Eliza are busy raising funds for their trips. Last summer they climbed the National Three Peaks – Snowdon, Ben Nevis and Scafell Pike – in just under 24 hours for sponsorship, and they’re each holding down two Saturday jobs to make more cash. On Saturday mornings they help to teach dance at Stardom School for Performing Arts in Shelf, and in the evenings they can be found working in the Suburban Style Bar in Bingley.

This week the girls are performing in Stardom’s show, Razzle Dazzle ’Em at the Victoria Hall in Halifax. Part of the proceeds from the production will go towards World Challenge.

The sisters have also received donations from Baildon Round Table and Bradford Catholic Players.

“The expeditions are all about team-building and developing leadership skills, as well as helping communities out there,” says Katie. “We’re going to be working with orphanages and helping to build new classrooms in schools, and we’ll be teaching English.

“It’s going to be a fantastic experience, I can’t wait to get out there. We’ve never been out to these countries before or done anything like this.”

Katie will travel to Laos in south-east Asia and down to Thailand. “We’ll be sleeping in hammocks in the jungle and staying with communities we visit along the way,” she says.

“We’ll be flying out there as a group of about 18 from school, then we get split into teams. Each team is overlooked by someone from World Challenge, but they don’t intervene unless there’s danger. It will be up to us to allocate various roles to people in the team, such as taking care of finances and making decisions such as whether to hire a boat to cross a river or find a route around it.

“It will be tough, especially as we’ll have to make so many of the decisions and work out problems along the various journeys, but I’m sure there’ll be a great feeling of achievement.”

Eliza will start her Ecuador trip with a week-long trek through the Cotopaxi National Park. “We’ll be looking at rainforest conservation and sleeping out in tents and rainforest cabins,” she says. “We might to get to stay in the comfort of the odd youth hostel if we’re lucky!”

Eliza will be travelling in a party of nine from school and, like Katie, will meet a World Challenge leader on arrival. “We’ll be given information from World Challenge, which we’ll have to use to contact the local authorities to find out about guides and how to reach the communities we’re working with,” says Eliza.

“We won’t find out until we get there which communities we’re going to be helping.”

The sisters recently went on a training session in Buxton to prepare for their overseas challenges.

“We went on a huge walk and learned about things like first aid and what to do if we get lost,” says Katie.

“As well as raising funds for the trips, and for our equipment, we’re trying to build up our stamina so we’re as fit as possible. We did the National Three Peaks with our dad in 23 hours 52 minutes. We’re going on runs around our village and we’re doing the Epilepsy Action run.”

Katie and Eliza will be joined by other members of their family, including their parents, Simon and Sue, in the Bradford 10k run in aid of Epilepsy Action next month.

The Yeadon-based charity has a special place in the girls’ hearts because their grandmother and uncle both suffer from epilepsy. The run, on Sunday, March 29, is supported by the Telegraph & Argus, Bradford Council and the Airedale Athletics squad. It will begin and end in Bradford’s Centenary Square, heading down Canal Road towards Frizinghall and back.

With regular training sessions, holding down two Saturday jobs, helping out at their father’s business, the Carroll Cleaning Company, and rehearsing for this week’s Stardom show – not to mention working hard on A-level studies – it’s not surprising that the girls have little spare time.

“There are some privileges we’re prepared to give up for now so we can achieve our goal of making this happen,” says Katie. “It will be the experience of a lifetime.”

“Last year, when we started raising funds, the trip was so far off it seemed like it was never going to happen, and now it’s just a few months away,” adds Eliza. “It’s quite daunting but we’re both really looking forward to it. It’s something we’ll never forget.”

The girls are aiming to raise £4,000 each, which will go towards funding the trip and some equipment. “A massive chunk of the money raised goes to projects World Challenge helps in various developing countries,” says Eliza.

Liz Davies, principal of Stardom School for Performing Arts, where Katie and Eliza have been learning tap, ballet and modern dance for four years, has made World Challenge one of two beneficiaries of this week’s show.

“It’s a fantastic cause. It’ll be a wonderful experience for the girls,” says Liz. “The other beneficiary is Martin House Children’s Hospice, which is our regular charitable cause. Our musical director, Mike Gilroy, is a music therapist there.”

World Challenge sets young people a series of mental and physical challenges, taking them outside their comfort zones and teaching them how to overcome adversity, cope with new environments and become more aware of their strengths and weaknesses.

Tapping into the organisation’s expertise and resources, youngsters work as a team; taking responsibility, setting and meeting objectives, and learning to become confident decision-makers.

The aim is also to help them become more environmentally-aware by exploring diverse landscapes, finding out about other cultures and gaining a broader global perspective.

Razzle Dazzle ’Em runs at the Victoria Theatre, Halifax, from tomorrow to Saturday. Tickets are available on (01422) 351158.