Last year I had the pleasure of helping our friend and alumni, Seth Walton with a winter outdoor living skills course for his Outdoor Leadership program. Pretty excited to do it again in the upcoming weeks. As temperatures get colder, people are going to be stuck inside more often. Programs like Seth’s provide young people with a new appreciation at the best of times, but in this current state of the world, it’s even more imporatant. I’m really looking forward to working with the students I met last year and helping them improve what they learned last time. It’ll also be great to get to work with another generation of students and get to see everything they’ve learned from Seth during their time with him.

We’ll be spending our time with the older students adding nuances to shelter building, axe and knife use, and fire-starting skills that they developed last year. The new students will get the chance to fell trees for the first time, use fire to make spoons, and build a big group shelter that they can use to stay warm. Having opportunities to bond with others is important for any developing person, but right now it’s hard to come by. Here’s hoping we provide these students with the skills to spend a little longer outdoors, socially distanced, but with friends this winter than they would have otherwise.