Sequencing For Learners cont.

Connecting youth to place; a crucial step in growing young minds

a keenly remembered wild place, and an adult who taught respect for nature.”

Our staff are very mindful of the discrepancies in age-wisdoms, and thus we work hard to meet trekkers where they are as we design itineraries and pick activities. We even design each summer trek with a leading question that is in-line with their age interests.

Our youngest trek, GO trek is all about fostering comfort while away from home and in outdoor community. Outfit gets to explore new skills hinging on the question, “What do I want to discover?” Outfit balances their time between curiosity-based exploration (of animals, ecosystems or skills), community building at base camp, and establishing their own little home up at the Outfit camp, where they are challenged with what is for many the first steps of independence- packing their own pack, picking out their clothes, sweeping their cabins, playing group games by the campfire. Wild Country Trek takes that a step further, asking “How do I make a difference” and practices different answers through hands-on science and advanced play. Our gender-divided treks get to ask themselves “Who am I? Who do I want to be” while exploring those answers in a supportive group of like-gendered peers engaging in physical and mental challenges with the Southwest as a stunning backdrop. And our capstone expedition, MDT, asks trekkers to take all they have come to understand from their experiences outside and ask “What can I do to give back to my community and land?” By the time a trekker reaches MDT age, they have graduated from examining the world piece by piece, and they can stand on the top of a mountain looking at the valley below, and consider what it is like to live in these places, what people have moved through these spaces, and how they fit into this picture.