On our long-term semester and expedition programs, we live and work together in close quarters for an extended period of time. Our goal is for individuals to learn and excel at hard skills, but without a plan and systems regarding how to live and work together, successful outcomes are harder to achieve.

Working as a team, called expedition behavior in outdoor education-speak, is a crucial component of the experience. We operate as a community in order to best serve the interests of the individuals involved. But community is the result, not the purpose, of living and working together. The experience at Jack Mountain isn’t about trust falls, talking sticks or other contrived techniques designed to build community. Our community is built upon the shared goals of the community members, with the focus is on individual achievement; getting people to a minimum level of competency on a wide variety of topics. But in doing so, we operate as a community.

About Our Field School Programs: Not about community, but community is a by-product. It’s about achievement and excellence; mastering the material and obtaining a depth of knowledge that’s becoming lost in the modern world. We live and work as a community, but that isn’t the purpose, it’s the result of working together.

Because unless you’re living alone in a cave on top of a mountain, you’re interacting with other people, and the skills of doing so (known as soft skills) are an important component of every successful business or interpersonal endeavor.