Outdoor Ed - Articles on Outdoor Education

Outdoor Sports Injury Prevention

Outdoor recreation is the fastest growing category of recreation in the U.S., and perhaps worldwide. In addition to hiking, trekking, backbacking, camping, fishing, hunting, skiing, swimming, boating, scuba diving, and all of the other outdoor recreational activities with which we are familiar can be added sports activities, some of which include competitions. So, when you consider surfing, windsurfing,mountain biking, rock climbing, adventure races, triathlons, marathons, and all of the assorted activities that are perpetrated outdoors, outdoor sports is a huge category.

Each activity has a set of rules for injury prevention. For instance, if you are a scuba diver, there are unique concerns for which you must be aware, such as how long you spend underwater and at what depth, rapidly you ascend from the depth, which marine animals to avoid, and so forth. There isn't enough space in this individual post to consider every activity, but there is certainly room for a list of generalities, which are the foundation upon which are built the specific considerations of injury prevention.

Here is a list of injury prevention recommendations for outdoor sports, whether they be recreational or competitive:

1. Be prepared. The Boy Scouts (and Girl Scouts) have it right. There is no substitute for preparedness. Adherence to this basic rule will prevent or ease the majority of mishaps that occur in the wild. Proper education prior to situations of risk allows you to cope in a purposeful fashion, rather than in a state of fear and panic.

2. Prior to undertaking a trip where you will be far from formal medical assistance, it is wise to attend to any obvious medical problems. If you have not done so within the past 6 months, visit a dentist. Make certain that all of your immunizations are up to date.

3. Use common sense. Many accidents occur because people ignore warning signs or don’t anticipate problems. Swimmers are stung by jellyfish outside protective net enclosures; nonswimmers drown while participating in hazardous whitewater rafting adventures.

4. Pay heed to rangers, posted warnings, weather reports, and the experience of seasoned guides. For instance, in hot and dry weather, know the specific fire risks, and take no chances.

5. Prepare for situations of risk by developing your skills in less challenging conditions.

6. Wear recommended personal safety equipment, such as a flotation jacket, safety harness, or climbing helmet.

7. Do not tolerate horseplay in dangerous settings.

8. Many health hazards of wilderness travel, such as falls, can be avoided by a reasonable degree of strength and endurance, which can only be acquired by conditioning. Every expedition member should begin from a state of maximum fitness.

9. Other health hazards, such as temperature extremes and high-altitude disorders, can in certain circumstances be avoided by acclimatization to the environment. Acclimatization is a physiological adaptation that is often different from, and may be unrelated to, physical fitness.

10. Be prepared for foul-weather conditions. Always assume that you will be forced to spend an unexpected night outdoors. Carry warm clothing and waterproof rain gear. 11. Break in all footwear, and take care to pad rough edges and exposed seams.

11. Prepare a trip plan (itinerary) and record it in a location (trailhead, ranger station, marina, or the like) where someone will recognize when a person or party is overdue and potentially lost or in trouble.

12. Make sure that children wear an item of bright clothing and carry a whistle that they know to blow if they are frightened or lost. If you carry a radio, know how to tune in to a weather information channel.

13. In most stories of miraculous ocean or wildland survival, the first chapter includes the account of how the victim lost his way. All wilderness travelers should carry maps, be proficient with compass routing, understand how to signal for help, and know in advance where they intend to explore.

14. People with specific medical disabilities, such as chronic severe lung disease, may be advised by a physician to avoid certain stressful environments, such as high altitude.

15. Anyone who undertakes vigorous physical activity should consume adequate calories in a well-balanced diet. A debilitating weight-reduction program should not be continued in the wilderness, where a rescue might depend on extraordinary effort and endurance.

16. To avoid dehydration and exhaustion, take adequate time to eat, drink, and rest. Most adult males require 3,000 to 5,000 food calories each day in order to sustain heavy physical exertion. Women require 2,000 to 3,500 calories. A nutritious diet can easily be maintained with proper planning. Don’t plan to live off the land unless you are a survival expert.

17. Fluid requirements have been well worked out for all levels of exercise. Most people underestimate their fluid requirements. Encourage frequent rest stops and water breaks. If natural sources of drinkable water (springs, wells, ice-melt runoff) will not be encountered, you should carry at least a 48-hour supply. Carry supplies for water disinfection.

18. Use the buddy system. Don't enter a remote area without a companion, or better, a few companions.

Read more of Paul's Blog enteries at HealthLine.

Experiential Education: A Fragile and Incomplete Project

Jay Roberts
Assistant Prof, Education
Director, Wilderness Programs
Earlham College

Keynote Speech to the Rocky Mountain Regional Conference of the Association for Experiential Education, April 7, 2006

Introduction

Projects are interesting things. My wife and I own an old, Victorian age house in Indiana. When we purchased it two years ago, we knew then that it would be a project to get it to where we wanted it to be. Several rooms were in various stages of construction, the backyard was a mudpit- the previous owner also had kids and I continue to find little spooky treasures all over the place including several decapitated dolls and a rather disturbing clown figurine. On our house inspection report, the inspector noted that the garage was in danger of falling down if the termites ever stopped holding hands. But, we love our house and the project that it is because we see its potential and we believe in the vision of what it can become.

Projects can be other things as well- such as an unfinished project. Our daughter will be turning two next weekend. I have learned that parenthood is most definitely a project and one that will always remain unfinished. Recently, she has been protesting both getting dressed and undressed. I feel like I am wrestling a spirit possessed oompa-loompa as I try to get her into and out of her pajamas. I am a logical person most of the time and I cannot seem to figure this out. How can you be upset BOTH about putting on your PJ’s AND conversely taking them off? One or the other makes much more sense. Either you LIKE your pj’s, hence you want them on and not off or you don’t like your pj’s- hence you want them off and never put on. But, of course, toddlers are not logical- or, at least not logical in the way we adults see things. I’ve come to realize that it’s not the pj’s that bother my daughter, it is CHANGE itself. This revelation does not make things any easier at changing time of course. This is why I consider raising my daughter a project too- and one that will always be incomplete- such is the role of a parent.

Projects can also be fragile. Sometimes it takes just the right combination of factors to pull it off- like a new route up some challenging and dangerous big wall. Other times the smallest hiccup can doom a project- like the time I told the Canadian border guard I was guiding a canoe trip for a group of students up in northern Ontario. After spending a night in customs limbo in Thunder Bay, I learned later that it is illegal to “guide” in Canada if you are not Canadian (the irony of it all was that at first I thought it was the undeclared tomatoes I was carrying that got me in trouble).

So, things can go wrong despite the best of intentions.

I would like to dedicate this talk tonight to Alvin. Alvin was a past student of mine and, in many ways, he is why I am here, in front of you tonight. Some time ago, Alvin helped to show me the fragility of the educational project and has inspired me ever since to spend my time trying to do better. Alvin will weave in and out of our conversation here tonight and I hope he will serve as a concrete reminder of why we are all here, doing what we do.

Alvin: Part One

In 1993, I was a team leader for a nationally known summer program in Lake Forest, Illinois. The camp specializes in brain-based, learning how to learn programs for at-risk youth. Their programs are highly experiential and it was through them that I got into this field in the first place. Now, while the camp targeted at-risk youth, it was predominantly highly privileged at-risk youth, kids from wealthy families who may have gotten into minor trouble either at school or with the law- the kind of kids popularized by the Brat Camp reality show recently on TV. In an effort to diversify the program, several scholarships were awarded to inner-city youth from South Chicago. Alvin was one of the first recipients and was placed in my group. Alvin was a young 15 and he still had that rolly-polly baby fat that made him seem even younger than he actually was. He was loud and out-going and his brashness (not to mention his skin color) stood him out within the camp community. Things were difficult right off the bat for Alvin. No one else looked like him, talked like him, or came from the same background. He portrayed a tough persona and the other kids in my group mostly kept their distance. During one of our first, intensive group sessions, Alvin spoke openly about the drugs he had done and watched others do. So openly, in fact, that some of the other campers in my group snickered and shook their heads, thinking Alvin was just showing off and not being real about his background and his history. I took to Alvin almost immediately. He had that kind of personality that even when he was being resistant and uncooperative, he was still engaging and alive. I’d take a thousand Alvin’s over one tired, dispassionate, and cynical kid. So I knew that things at camp were likely to change for Alvin and they did. The ropes course day was huge for him. The physical learning and trust he established with his group over the course of that day seemed to shift something in him. Slowly, his energy and brashness turned from negative attention getting to positive encouragement and support of his group. We have all seen this countless times- camp was doing its magic on Alvin. By the end of the program, Alvin was transformed. He cried the final night of camp and made sure to get everyone’s phone numbers and addresses before his session ended. I remember the hug I got from Alvin the day he left- he was just a kid needing love- such a simple thing. As he hugged me he leaned in to my ear and whispered a private message, one only for me to hear. He said, “you’ll always be my favorite teach…”

It is this sort of success story that we all know and can appreciate. The transformative power of experiential education and its ability to reach kids in a way that can shift them, despite previous school experiences, challenged background, or diagnosed condition. But, Alvin’s story does not end there. His story has more to teach.

Cornell West, perhaps our most provocative philosopher-activist in the US today once wrote,

“Anyone who has the audacity to adopt a democratic vision cannot be optimistic, though I do not conflate optimism with hope. Why? Because democracies are rare in human history, they are fragile, and historically they tend not to last that long…And America has been so privileged because there has always been a prophetic slice across race, region, and class, and gender, and sexual orientation, a progressive slice that says we are not going to give up on this fragile democratic project, it is incomplete and unfinished, but we are not going to give up on it, even against the grain of so much human history.”

I would like, tonight, to draw from West’s notion of democracy’s “fragile and incomplete project” and suggest that the time is right for Experiential Education as a field to take a hard look at where we are and the future challenges and possibilities that lie before us. I believe our work in this field is both fragile and incomplete and I hope to share with you both my concerns and my hopes for the field as we move forward. But, like West, I am not cynical about the future. I have hope for our field and for the project of education in the United States. I believe now, perhaps more than ever, we need the values, beliefs, and ideals of experiential education for our children. But this hope is not a blind optimism. There are forces allied against such a vision of the future. There is much work to be done. So I have a hope without illusion and I would like to share this vision with you as we look toward the future of our schools, and our democracy.

On Democracy and Democratic Living

Now that I have mentioned “democracy” I would like to say a few words about it before we get into the nitty-gritty of experiential education if you will indulge me. Democracy is one of those terms that, if you are not careful, can mean nothing by meaning everything. It is certainly evoked with some regularity by folks on all sides of the political spectrum. I recently heard Garrison Keilor give an apt definition of it. He said that democracy was a lot like sex. When it is good, it is really good. And, when it is bad, it’s still pretty good. Someone else (I believe Winston Churchill) said that democracy is the worst form of governance imaginable, except when compared to all the other options. To me, I return to John Dewey’s construction of democracy not as a form of government but as a form of living. It is necessarily social and practical- that is, it is a process that can be practiced on a daily basis in a myriad of ways as communities of people interact with one another. And practice is important. Democratic living is never static, it changes as conditions change which requires a constant “re-figuring out” of how we are to best live with one another. Interacting in such a way takes practice. This is why Dewey, while an intellectual giant in the world of philosophy who could have placed his attentions on any number of lofty questions or problems, chose schools as his main project. To Dewey, it was education and schools that served as the central laboratory for democratic living. Schools are where we learn to live well with ourselves and with one another.

I say all of this because I believe (and I am certainly not the only one) that we are living in a time where democratic living is threatened. We often speak about our democracy as the central strength of the United States. But we seem to focus less on the small, public spaces that encourage the growth and development of that democracy- that is, the places where we can practice democratic living. Protecting our democracy is about much more than border security or the global war on terrorism. And in relation to schooling, it is about much more than test scores and “academic achievement” as it is currently defined. Deb Meier, one of our best writers about the connections between democracy and schooling talks about the real crisis (not the crisis of test scores) in our education system. She wrote,

“an understanding of this other crisis begins by noting that we have the lowest voter turnout by far of any modern industrial country; we are exceptional for the absence of responsible care for our most vulnerable citizens (we spend less on child welfare- baby care, medical care, family leave- than almost every foreign counterpart); we don’t come close to other advanced countries in income equity; and our high rate of (and investment in) incarceration places us in a class by ourselves” (12).

Vital, democratic living in community with one another would not allow such a condition to arise. How fragile has our democracy become when we do not vote for our leaders, we do not see the most vulnerable among us, and we do not help those in most need? I would like to argue, tonight, that this kind of crisis requires a renewed emphasis on placing experience at the center of the educational endeavor. So that in our schools we begin again practicing being active in our communities, seeing and talking with each other across race, class, and generation, and understanding our responsibilities as citizens of our country and our planet.

What does it mean to place experience at the center of the educational endeavor? I think it involves at least five key characteristics:

1. Students actively engaged in the co-construction of the curriculum not just passive recipients of it ;

2. Integrated, thematic content that immerse students in relevant, local, regional, and global problems that draw upon a number of disciplines and perspectives to try to address. Since when in the real world are problems solved using just math, or social studies, or biology?

3. Teaching people first, not content. Real, live people with interests, emotions, challenges, and gifts and the understanding that relationships drive learning;

4. The value of less is more. Meaningful, immersive, challenging experiences are worth a hundred thousand worksheets, pop-quizzes, and standardized tests. We overload our students with data and information- and consequently they do not gain the crucial traits needed in a democracy- knowledge and wisdom;

5. Finally, orchestrating learning environments that invite students to make meaning of their learning through deliberate reflection and consequent action- returning to an understanding that knowledge has moral consequences- that we should not learn just for learning sake but to do something with that knowledge to make the world a better place.

But, before we get ahead of ourselves I would like to caution us in assuming that the field of experiential education does all of these things, that it places experience at the center of the educational endeavor. In fact, as Alvin will show us, we may be far more fragile and incomplete than we think.

Alvin’s Story: Part 2

After Alvin left I got back into the busyness of camp and preparing for the next session. Anyone who has worked at camp knows that, while the kids affect you and you love them, they also come and go. And despite the promises of writing and calling and remaining lifelong friends, things fade over time. With a new set of campers came a new set of challenges and kids who needed support and love. While I certainly hadn’t forgotten about Alvin I was somewhat surprised, four days into the next session, when the office paged me and said I had a call from Alvin. I went up and picked up the phone. It was Alvin alright- we traded inside jokes and pleasantries but I also detected an edge to his voice. When I asked how he was doing, he opened up. He couldn’t find anyone to talk to about his camp experience back at home. He missed the camp and the group and asked if he could come back. I told him it was against camp policy to come on to grounds if you were not a camper in that session. And besides, how was he going to get up here? He said he understood. He told me that he loved me and I said I did back- but there was a different emotion in his voice than mine. His was the voice of a kid hanging on to a thin thread of a lifeline. Mine was that of a camp counselor just doing my job. A few days later I got a message from the office that Alvin had called again. During some free time I called him back and, with tears in his voice, he said he was in real trouble. He needed to come back. He didn’t have any friends and things were rough at home. I told him all the things we were trained to say about taking ownership for your situation and thinking positively about what you can control. But it was clear that it wasn’t what he needed. I remember that we ended that phone call awkwardly. As I walked away from the office, Alvin’s “favorite teach” began to have his doubts about what camp had really done for him (or to him?).

Fragile

Alvin has led me to see several ways in which our field is fragile right now. As I alluded to earlier, we are living in the midst of perhaps the most aggressive school reform movement in our nation’s history. Schools, historically the responsibility of localities and the state, are increasingly under the control of the federal government through the landmark No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (even as the federal government kicks in only around 7% of overall school funding). What I call the “three A’s” of this reform movement dominant school activity and the rationale for curriculum and content: Achievement, Assessment, and Accountability. It becomes difficult for those who disagree with the current state of affairs to voice disagreement- who, in their right mind is against “achievement” or “assessment” or “accountability” after all? Of course, no one. But what many disagree with is how these things are defined under NCLB. Achievement becomes tightly defined around content standards that hyper-focus on math and literacy skills. Just last month, a non-partisan report released by the Center for Educational Policy stated that this achievement focus has led to the reduction in curriculum across the board including music, the arts, and physical education. The study found that 71 percent of the nation’s 15,000 school districts had reduced the hours spent on other subjects to focus on reading and math skills.

Of course, along with achievement must come assessment. We are all familiar with the ways in which standardized testing has dominated the educational landscape. Most reasonable folks see a reason for testing, but as Deb Meier states, we are testing our kids to death. Again, there is a difference between data, information, knowledge and wisdom. We are at the point now where testing has been conflated with learning. If test scores in a given school jump 7%, then, by golly, those kids are learning! But again, excellent teachers know that a test is but a snapshot of where a child is in their learning. It’s like trying to place your position on a map using only one bearing- it gives you information but doesn’t tell the whole picture.

And finally, we must hold children, teachers, and schools accountable to these assessments. This accountability culture comes from the corporate world where phrases like “measurable results,” “return on investment,” and “performance driven” help make employees and companies more competitive. But, many question analogies that equate schools with businesses. A colleague of mine who teaches in a public school in Dayton told me how her school motto- which is plastered everywhere in the form of posters, buttons, and stickers- is “every second counts.” What message do we send about learning and education when we communicate to children that every second counts? That they are to be counted and accounted for? Kurt Hahn famously emphasized that we are all crew, not passengers. But the accountability culture in schools today takes it to the extreme, removing the social aspects of being in it together, a crew, while placing sole responsibility on the individual student to perform, on cue. Every second counts.

This is the context that our field currently operates within, for better or for worse. How do we respond? Experiential education has certainly not been unaffected by these trends. Our field is much more standardized today than in the times when our motto was “let the mountains speak for themselves.” We have certifications and accreditations, training protocols, and industry standards. Most would argue that these have been welcome innovations. Experiential education has also achieved a stronger foothold in schools. From the early days of Project Adventure, we have become much more legitimized beyond even physical education curriculum to the myriad ways experience benefits classroom learning- from service learning, to environmental education and leadership development. Again, these are positive steps for a field that has begun to mature. And yet…

At what point does cooperation become co-optation? That is to say, as experiential education steps further and further into the mainstream, is there a danger than it can be changed from its potentially transformative roots to a standardized, homogenized, and potential lifeless pedagogy? I see two specific processes that our field is vulnerable to: 1.) What sociologist George Ritzer called McDonaldization, and 2.) What social theorist Henry Giroux called Disnification. By McDonaldization, Ritzer meant the process by which systems become increasingly standardized through the elements of replicability, efficiency, and control. This is, of course, what the success of McDonald’s has taught the world. Your Big Mac sandwich should taste the same wherever you purchase it (replicability); the amount of time it takes from ordering to eating should be minimized to every extent possible (efficiency); and, variation amongst transactions between employees and customers should be controlled through a high degree of scripting (do you want fries with that?).

There is some evidence that this is happening in our field. As schools grow increasingly fixated on specific content, achievement, and test scores, “seat time” is placed at a premium. That means that, when experiential education is utilized (if at all) it tends to be highly scripted, for short durations, and with minimal reflective components. For example, while ropes course programs are used more now than ever, I would wager that the average amount of time on courses has gone down (a great potential area for research for anyone out there looking for one). “Canned” programs from service learning trips, to guaranteed summit bids, to environmental education centers have blossomed as educators, administrators, and schools use experiential education as a sort of spice and or candy sprinkling on top of their “meat and potato’s” traditional curriculum.

The other process experiential education is vulnerable to is Disnification. By this term, Henry Giroux meant the ways in which experiences are equated with entertainment and commodified- becoming part of a system where things become valued only for their ability to be “consumed.” I am reminded, after 9-11, of the act of patriotism that was asked of us by our President. It was not to buy war bonds, it was not to start a victory garden, it was not to volunteer- it was to use your tax cut and go out and buy new goods- refrigerators, dvd’s, and the like. In my program, I frequently get calls for “a little teambuilding” or “high ropes” for schools in the area who would like to do it for 3 hours, once per year as a nice day off of school. Artificial climbing walls are now frequently set up in malls, cruise ships, and amusement parks, all to allow for maximum efficiency (many now are set-up without the need for a belayer) and turnover. Once you’ve “done” the wall, its time to move on to something else. In fact, my colleague and I joke that we are not far off from the brave new world of AFM’s – automated facilitator machines where, like ATM’s, you walk up, insert your card, and then choose options for your ropes course experience… What have we lost when the wonderfully rich metaphors of our field become commodified and disnified? When activities don’t even require a belayer anymore? When kids show up to do a program with us saying, “oh, rappelling? I already did that- do you have a bungy jump?” When there is no time to do anything more than a few activities for a couple of hours? This is what some have called “edutainment.” Experiential education is much more than a series of activities. In Dewey’s vision (and many others) it was not meant to be a technique isolated from larger democratic aims. Dewey himself wrote, “what avail is it to win prescribed amounts of information about geography and history, to win the ability to read and write, if in the process the individual loses his own soul; loses his appreciation of things worthwhile; loses the desire to apply what he has learned…?”(49).

I guess I mean to say that I believe our field is very fragile to these processes at the present moment. In the treatment field they often say that first comes awareness that you have a problem. I think we have a problem.

Now, I am about half-way through and I’d like to invite us into some reflection. So, please turn to a neighbor or two and discuss what you have heard thus far. What ways do you see experiential education as fragile?

Incomplete

In addition to being fragile, I believe our project in experiential education is incomplete. And, in many ways, it is our incompleteness that has made us fragile to the processes just described. The two go hand-in-hand. I also see two main ways we are incomplete- we are too narrow in our theoretical scope (essentially, in the way we define experiential education) and 2.) we have not looked closely enough at the ways in which our pedagogy speaks to issues of social justice (about the environment and about the disenfranchised). This is what I have taken to call the “roots and fruits” dilemma. I’ll talk about each in turn.

Our roots are too shallow. In some ways, it seems our field is like the fellow who has spent a little too much time alone in the wilderness who, upon re-entry, seems uneasy, incapable of translating the power of his experience to others, and perhaps would just prefer to return to his isolated world rather than engage with difference. We need to get out of the wilderness in a few specific ways. One is by diversifying our intellectual ancestors and the how we think about what experiential education is and is not. Most people think of John Dewey, Kurt Hahn, maybe Paul Petzhodlt, and perhaps, in the more modern context, David Kolb and his learning cycle. This is a fine list. But it is also a list, with respect, of dead, white men. There are others who have written about the role of experience in education that we do not hear from nor do we expose our students to. These are silenced voices that can enrich and expand the ways we think about our field. These voices also bring us “in from the outside” by engaging us with other theorists and practicioners who write about issues in schooling and education. People like Paolo Freire, Patricia Hill Collins, Amy Gutman, Nel Noddings, Deb Meier, Parker Palmer, Robert Fried, and, one of my favorites, Dorothy Lee. Haven’t heard of her? It’s no surprise. I have never heard her referenced in any context within the field of experiential education. Here is what Lee has to say about the danger of hyper-focusing on literacy at the expense of placing experience at the center of the curricular endeavor:

“Are we paying a heavy price for literacy? Are we giving up our heritage of wonder, of curiousity, of questing, of plunging into chaos and creating life out of it? Are we giving up our sense of mystery, the excitement of being lost in ambiguity and building a world out of it? Have we given up this heritage for the sake of literacy, which gives us a label instead of experience.”

Lee wrote that in 1976. What a remarkable and powerful voice, almost entirely overlooked by our field.

One other voice that is under-developed in our field is that of brain-based learning. I was so heartened to see Renata Caine keynote the AEE international conference this year in Tucson. We are learning so much about how the brain learns and much of it supports and re-affirms placing experience at the center of the curriculum. Noted researcher Eric Jensen provides one example of the potential of this connection. In his book, Brain Based Learning, Jensen lists the five elements of enriched learning environments (challenge, novelty, feedback, choice, and time)… sound familiar? He goes on to suggest how teachers can use this in the classroom:

“Create a multi-sensory environment…Increase social interaction and group work. Move to novel locations frequently…Provide quality, not just quantity time…Provide positive feedback; and celebrate accomplishments with fun…and most of all, offer students choices so that their learning is meaningful”

I can’t imagine a stronger affirmation of what we do. So often in our field we rely on anecdotal evidence to back-up our educational approaches. But, in the current reform climate, such rationale is simply not acceptable. Practicioners and theorists must become much more comfortable with quantitative methodologies and research strategies as well as searching beyond our field for support and evidence. The brain-based learning field is one such potential ally.

Besides shallow and narrow roots, our other area of incompleteness is under-developed fruits. That is to say, what is the purpose of experiential education? What does it bring forth to the world? Individual transformation is heavily emphasized in our field but at the expense of closely examining how our pedagogy impacts groups of people. Think of the term “hoods in the woods.” We toss that term around with some regularity. Now, really think about that term… is that really what we want to be communicating to the disenfranchised about who we are, what we do, and what we value? I would hope that we can eradicate such overt racism from our field. But there is something deeper here than surface attempts at diversity and multiculturalism. It goes to the very core of what we do. I believe, as a field, we have grown to under-emphasize the moral consequences of knowledge. Many in education critique knowledge for knowledge sake. I would posit that a similar critique could be leveled at experiential education: activity for activity sake. The important question is: activity to what further use or purpose? How do our curriculum designs make the world a better, more equitable, more sustainable place? For example, do our service learning programs truly ask students to question and critique a society where such profound inequality exists? Do our outdoor programs facilitate critical dialogue about issues of sustainability and industrialism beyond simply teaching about LNT? And, when we facilitate programs for the disenfranchised, how much say do these culture groups have in the co-creation of the program and curriculum?

And this is a tough one. During talks like this one I inevitably get asked about what we should do to “solve the diversity problem.” Mostly this involves questions of getting our participation numbers up. My response is this: before we think about getting numbers up, we need to think about who is creating the curriculum and for whom. Most of the curriculum in experiential education is created by well-off white folks to be delivered to either A.) other well-off white folk, or B.) not well-off “at-risk” folk. Like in so many areas of our society, unless we see real representation at the highest levels in terms of gender, race, class and other marginalized identities, we will not move very far beyond this passive deliverer:receiver construct even if the actual methodology is experiential. Experience in education does not just exist within the activity, but it is in the active construction of the learning experience itself. This is so important to me that I will say it again: experience in education does not just exist within the activity, but it is in the active construction of the learning experience itself. To illustrate this, I would like to return to Alvin- my student camper who has remained my teacher to this day.

Alvin’s Story: Part 3

About a month after the second call from Alvin that ended awkwardly, I got another message from the office. It was Alvin again and he wanted me to call him back. I’d like to think that I simply forgot or that I got too busy with the next session of camp, but I know better. I never called him back. I didn’t want to because I knew I didn’t have anything else to say- there was nothing in my training, in my background, or in my manual that told me how to deal with the kind of pain and hurt that Alvin was going through. This is part of what WEB Dubois called racial two-ness. Existing in-between worlds- part of both but unable to identify exclusively with either. Richard Rodriguez, in his powerful memoir on bilingual education Hunger of Memory, describes the dilemma this way:

“From the story of the scholarship boy there is no specific pedagogy to glean. There is, however, a much larger lesson. His story makes clear that education is a long, unglamorous, even demeaning process- a nurturing never natural to the person one was before one entered a classroom… [the scholarship boy] both wants to go back and yet thinks he has gone beyond his class, feels weighted with knowledge of his own …situation.”

I have never forgotten about Alvin though I do not know what has happened to him. He was not well served by our so-called transformative experiential education. He spent just enough time with us to open up and reveal the vulnerabilities of a young man needing love, and then he was released, fragile and incomplete, into a world no longer one that he knew how to navigate. And for that, Alvin, I want to say something out-loud, in public, that I have yearned to say for so long… I am sorry. I am sorry I did not call you back. I am sorry you were not given more support. I am sorry that our program and your experience failed both you and us. And, every chance that I get, I will think about ways to do better.

Conclusion

Alvin’s story puts into perspective many of the elements that I believe make our field fragile and incomplete at the present moment. Parker Palmer, a noted writer on the role of teaching, discusses an old Hasidic tale in his book The Courage To Teach. He writes:

I once heard this Hasidic tale: “We need a coat with two pockets. In one pocket there is dust, and in the other pocket there is gold. We need a coat with two pockets to remind us of who we are. Knowing, teaching, and learning under the grace of great things will come from teachers who own such a coat and who wear it to class every day.”

I believe that the field of experiential education is also like a coat with two pockets. I have spent the time here this evening speaking about the pocket full of dust, but it is critically important that we also celebrate our pocket full of gold. We need to remind ourselves that we are defined by BOTH the dust and the gold. It is not enough to rest on our real or imagined laurels, nor is it permissible to simply criticize the ways we don’t match up with our ideals and values. An exclusive emphasis on one or the other yields either a mindless optimism or a defeatist cynicism. A vital democratic project thrives on neither of these extremes. An Arizona rancher once told me and a group of students learning about Western water issues that, “we need to find ways to re-discover the radical center” in problem solving. A place where we can hold these challenges and opportunities in tension with one another without letting either one go. Two pockets.

If you are waiting for the five-point plan to make experiential education solid and complete, I am afraid I will disappoint. The theme of this conference is “Bringing It Home.” What I hope we can all bring home is the sense that we will forever exist in that place of being both fragile and incomplete- just as Cornell West described the larger democratic project. We should be aware of this fact, ever vigilant, but also full of hope and celebrating the tensions that arise from this place. From time to time, Alvin reminds me that it doesn’t always work. That sometimes we fail. But I also know that I am committed to this field because of students like Alvin. The fact that we don’t have all the answers should not be lamented. It should be celebrated. After all, isn’t this what we remind our participants as they contemplate a complex problem solving initiative? Or a scary climb? Or a challenging addiction? Cruxes make our lives meaningful.

I’d like to conclude tonight with the words of two great poets- each of whom speak to this issue of not knowing- and, being OK with not knowing. First is a poem called “The Real Work” by Wendell Berry.

“It may be that when we no longer know what to do
We have come to our real work
And that when we no longer know which way to go
We have come to our real journey. |
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.”

And the last word must go to great poet Maria Ranier Rilke in his letters to a young poet. His words speak my mind better than I ever could.

“Be patient toward all that is unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves… Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

Thank you for allowing me to live my questions with you tonight.

Bear Safety and Defense--Important Do's and Don'ts

Some of the best spots in the world for outdoor recreation are also home to bears, and few wild animals seem to inspire a greater range of emotions and reactions in humans than bruins. From stuffed toys to mascots for sports teams and from the subjects of TV documentaries to "actors" in ads that promote everything from vehicles to personal care products, bears seem to pervade our culture. As a result there are a lot of misconceptions about these magnificent animals.

Outdoor educators and group leaders may find some surprising recent developments in bear safety and defense. Hikers, campers, photographers, hunters and even casual tourists need to know how to reduce the risks of bear encounters--and how to respond if they encounter a bruin in the wild. Even in prime bear habitat such as Yellowstone or Alaska, chances of an untoward experience can be reduced by following a few basic guidelines.

Experts such as Dr. Tom Smith, formerly of the Alaska Science Center, Chuck Bartlebaugh of the Center for Wildlife Information, and members of The Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee (IGBC) offer the following strategies for minimizing the risks of injury in a close encounter of the worst kind. I'll also include links to free, on-line resources that provide valuable training materials for any outdoor educator.

Education. Get reliable information about bears and bear safety. One thing's for certain—the actions of the characters in those TV commercials don't qualify as good advice! Two great places to start on-line are Dr. Smith's article Safe Conduct in Bear Country and the Center for Wildlife Information's Be Bear Aware site. (If you're reading this off-line, complete web addresses for these and all other sources listed are included at the end of this article.)

Dr. Smith notes, "…we see that a large number of bear-human encounters could have been avoided had people done the right things (e.g., store food properly, make noise while hiking through dense brush, not pushing bears when attempting to photograph them, etc.)."

Avoidance. Don't do things which are likely to attract bears to your location. This includes appropriate use and storage of food and scented personal care items, plus proper campsite location, layout and hygiene. Even washing and cooking water or spilled fuel from stoves can attract bears to camp. Dr. Smith's article cited in the previous paragraph includes detailed tips on camping in bear country and information about bear-resistant storage containers (PDF) is available on the IGBC website.

If you do see a bear, keep your distance. What's a safe buffer? Various national parks suggest—or require—that you stay anywhere from 100 yards to ¼ mile from bears. Now you know why you bought that great telephoto lens or spotting scope! Make local inquiry about guidelines when visiting national parks or similar areas.

No surprises. Dr. Smith notes that "the greatest contributing factor to bear attacks is surprise…. Bear attacks have consistently occurred in habitats where visibility is poor, underscoring the fact that given a chance, most bears will avoid a conflict with people." Mick Holm, Superintendent of Montana's Glacier National Park, notes that "Your best defense is to avoid a bear encounter in the first place by making your presence known. Bells are usually not loud enough; instead, you should call out or clap at frequent intervals, being especially vigilant near streams and at blind spots on the trails.”

Proper Response. Know what to do if you find yourself in a potential conflict with a bear. Experts have different advice about dealing with black vs. grizzly bears, so check with rangers or wildlife officials in the area where you live or plan to visit. Links to helpful information are included on the wildlife safety page on my website.

Good Defense. Bear Spray is a defensive product and is no substitute for following the above precautions. However, it can help tip the odds in your favor in the event an attack is imminent. The active ingredient in bear spray is extracted from hot red peppers, so bear spray is sometimes referred to as "bear pepper spray." It's extremely important to avoid simply calling these products "pepper spray," because many people mistakenly purchase and carry one of the numerous types of personal defense or law enforcement pepper sprays designed for use against other humans rather than bears. The products are definitely not the same!

Chuck Bartlebaugh, Director of the Center for Wildlife Information, cites a recent survey of hikers in Glacier National Park. Out of 50 hikers contacted who were carrying a defensive spray, only 15 had a product certified for use against bears. Only purchase and carry bear spray products that meet EPA standards and are clearly labeled "for deterring attacks by bears." Carrying the wrong product can create a false sense of security and put the person at risk when it doesn't perform as needed during a bear encounter

Bartlebaugh suggests the following specifications when purchasing bear spray:

A spray distance of 25 feet under optimum conditions. (Factors such as wind, moisture and the age of the canister itself can all reduce the effective distance of the product.)

Minimum spray duration of 6 seconds;

Minimum net content of 7.9 ounces or 225 grams.

Bear experts offer the following additional recommendations:

Carry the bear spray in a quickly accessible location such as a hip or chest holster. If faced with a charging bear, you don't have time to start digging in your pack. In your tent, keep the spray readily available next to your flashlight.

Bear spray should be used as a deterrent only in an aggressive or attacking confrontation with a bear. These products are only effective when sprayed as an airborne cloud and make direct contact with the eyes and nose of an approaching animal.

These products are not a repellent and should never be applied to people, tents, packs, other equipment or the surrounding area. Research at the Alaska Science Center found that the residue from the spray may actually attract bears, even several days after the product was used!

Keep a firm grip on the canister and aim slightly down and toward the approaching bear; many people tend to aim too high, which could allow the bear to run under the cloud of spray.

Don't forget that a bear can run at speeds up to 35 miles per hour. Try to spray early enough so the bear, if charging, runs into the widest bear pepper spray cloud and has time to react to the product. If possible, spray when a charging bear is still 30 to 40 feet away.

For more important information on bear spray see on-line articles by Dr. Tom Smith and the Center for Wildlife Information. These products are a great safety tool—if you know how to use them properly.

There are some differences of opinion about whether a canister of bear spray should ever be "tested," even in a safe location. "Test firings" reduce the amount of spray available in the can if the product is ever actually needed, leave a residue on the spray nozzle than may be an attractant to bears or a potential contaminant for the individual carrying the canister, and present the possibility of an accidental exposure to the user.

It is, however, important to know how to use bear spray before you need it. Inexpensive training canisters, which look and operate like the real thing, contain the propellant but no active ingredient. They're available from the same companies that sell the spray . An on-line video on the use of bear spray and other backcountry tips is available on the Backcountry Trip Planner page on Yellowstone National Park's website.

Finally, what about firearms as a more effective defense against bears? In addition to the fact that carrying weapons is against the law in areas such as national parks, many people will probably be surprised by the following information from the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service:

"… based on their investigations of human-bear encounters since 1992, persons encountering grizzlies and defending themselves with firearms suffer injury about 50% of the time. During the same period, persons defending themselves with [bear] pepper spray escaped injury most of the time, and those that were injured experienced shorter duration attacks and less severe injuries. Canadian bear biologist Dr. Stephen Herrero reached similar conclusions based on his own research—a person’s chance of incurring serious injury from a charging grizzly doubles when bullets are fired versus when bear spray is used." For the complete text of this publication, see "Bear Spray vs. Bullets: Which Offers Better Protection?" (PDF)

The chance to see and even photograph a bear in the wild can be a thrilling experience if people follow good procedures. However, in today's world, I suppose I must include the disclaimer that the above is for information purposes only, and I can't guarantee that even if you follow all the rules, you'll be 100% safe from a problem with a bear in the wild. However, if outdoor educators, resource professionals and recreationists will get accurate information, share it with others, and combine that knowledge with good judgment, both people and bruins will benefit from the continued survival of wild bears in today's world.

Websites for publications cited and additional on-line information.

Here are the complete website addresses for publications cited in this article.

Glacier National Park Video on Bear Safety http://www.nps.gov/archive/glac/video/avbear.mov (Quicktime)

Center for Wildlife Information at http://www.centerforwildlifeinformation.org/ has excellent downloadable publications, including: "Be Bear Aware," "Bear Spray - What Retailers and Consumers should know about Bear Spray," "Hiking and Camping in Bear, Cougar and Rattlesnake Country Instructor's Guide," and" Who's Who" (a 4-page guide to identifying black and grizzly bears).

Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee site at http://www.fs.fed.us/r1/wildlife/igbc/ includes a Bear Safety link to articles about IGBC Certified Bear-Resistant Containers and Bear Pepper Spray.

U. S. Environmental Protection Agency includes links to companies which sell "Acceptable Registered Bear Deterrent Products In United States" on its website: http://www.epa.gov/region08/toxics_pesticides/pests/beardeter.html

U.S.G.S. Alaska Science Center, Biological Science Office. Very useful articles based on sound scientific research include "Bear Safety (Safe Conduct in Bear County)," "Bear Pepper Spray: Research and Information," and "A Century of Bear-Human Conflict in Alaska: Analyses and Implications." The site is: http://www.absc.usgs.gov/research/brownbears/brownbears.htm

U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service has several very useful "fact sheets," including "How to Avoid Grizzly Bears", and "Bear Spray vs. Bullets: Which Offers Better Protection?" on their site: http://www.r6.fws.gov/species/mammals/grizzly/fact_sheets.htm

Wildlife safety tips from a variety of agencies and organizations are included on my website at http://www.heyranger.com/index_files/Page977.htm

Yellowstone National Park's "Backcountry Trip Planner" includes a video on the use of bear spray at http://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/backcountrytripplanner.htm

Teaching in the Outdoors: A Primer

INTRODUCTION

Teaching in general can be a scary thing. We are put in a position of authority and knowledge whether or not we feel like an expert in the particular area. We can feel pressure to know “everything” and be able to answer all questions. We want our students to have confidence in our ability to lead them through new experiences. This is all compounded by the fact that we don’t teach in a nice, organized classroom environment. Instead, we teach outside—with all the good and bad that can come with that. Sometimes we are given “teachable moments” that make it easy to educate. Other times, despite our best lesson plans, our students are too bored, too hungry, too scared, or just plain too distracted to pay attention. Teaching outdoors is definitely a challenge and there is no one way to do it right. But there are a few things that might help you along the way.

TIMING

When you teach a lesson and for how long can make a huge difference between success and failure with your students. Consider carefully the timing of your lesson. Will it be immediately useful? Is it a snack break lesson, a before dinner lesson, and after dinner lesson, a morning lesson, or a layover day lesson? Each time frame presents challenges and opportunities. Match your content and your objectives with your timing. Generally speaking, mornings are better for intellectual topics, afternoons are better for hands-on activities, and evenings are better for interpersonal discussions. Think AM-Brain, PM-Body, and Evening-Heart.

DURATION

Almost every teacher that ever stood in front of students has made the mistake of trying to do too much. This is especially true in outdoor contexts. Your students will be easily distracted and many factors will influence their attention spans from temperature fluctuations, to bug bites, to hunger pains, to homesickness. Less is more. Chunk your information into 25-30 minute units maximum. Break up longer lessons with active movement and reflection. Think of your content as gum and your students processing, practicing, and reflecting as the chewing. You want less gum and more chewing.

PREPARATION

Know your stuff. As an old crusty teacher of mine used to say, “worry about what you know, not what you don’t know!” Spend the time to develop a strong lesson plan—use this useful experiential lesson plan frame: EELDRC (Enroll, Experience, Label, Demonstrate, Review, Celebrate) or some other frame to help you hit all the important stages of an effective lesson. Write it down—maybe even show it to your co-instructors and get their feedback. The more comfortable you are with your design the more you can teach people and not content. Finally, be in a “positive state of non-expectancy.” That is, once you have a bomber lesson plan, be prepared to throw it all out based on how you are relating to your students and how your students are relating to the content.

PRESENTATION

You can’t sell the steak without the sizzle! How do you “fire up” your lesson to encourage maximum attention and retention? Here are a few quick tips:

1.) Use visual aids. Portable flip charts are the best for this and be sure to include different colors on your visuals. Pre-made flips are the most effective as presentations can be sloppy written in the moment. You can make a simple backcountry flip chart with Avery Write-On Cling Sheets and some duct tape or a simple white garbage bag, dry erase markers, and a sleeping pad. Put the whole shebang in a ziplock bag and you’ll have a lightweight, portable flipchart wherever and whenever you want.

2.) Think about where you are presenting. Are your students facing into the sun? Are you in the middle of a mosquito-infested swamp? Is it too windy? Look for great teachable moment sites like a high point for map and compass or glaciology or a mood inspiring campfire for a more introspective talk.

3.) Get good coaching. Have your co-instructors give you feedback on your presentation style. Have them focus on how you are presenting—not your content. Are you mumbling? Do you do annoying motions with your hands? Do you establish good eye contact?

4.) Classroom design. Horseshoes work best for lecture style; circles for more cooperative discussions. The more scattered people are the more scattered the class environment will feel.

REFLECTION

Too many times this is missed and latest brain research is affirming the absolute necessity of this step in the learning process. Give your students multiple opportunities to reflect on your lesson. The general rule of thumb is 10-24-7. You should reflect/review new material every 10 minutes, every 24 hours, and every 7 days. A few ways to make this happen:

1.) During the lesson, use the “turn to your neighbor” tool. Part way through the lesson have students turn to a neighbor and review what was just delivered. This can be done creatively with good questions (e.g “turn to your neighbor and tell them one thing you really understand from the last 20 minutes and one thing you have a question about…”).

2.) Use large group de-briefs to cement the learning. At the end of your lesson, do a go-around where everyone shares one thing they will take away from the lesson.

3.) Give them skill practice in the middle of the lesson. This is the “demonstrate” stage of the lesson plan I included earlier. Often misunderstood as the teacher demonstrating to the student, it is actually the exact opposite. How can you get the students to demonstrate to you whether or not they are getting the material?

4.) Give them immediate opportunities to apply skills just learned (e.g. teach a river crossing lesson “dry” knowing that you will have one to do the next day. When that moment comes the next day, sit back and watch them perform without your assistance).

5.) Journaling on what they have learned on the course so far in a list to help them realize what they have accomplished so far. There are many, many ways to reflect. Honor the learning by allowing adequate time for this.

CONCLUSION

There are many other tools that can be useful to sharpen your lesson plans. Be curious and observant and you can pick up many tricks and techniques along the way. The most important thing of all? You guessed it, AUTHENTICITY. Be yourself, know your limits, and be honest with yourself, your co-instructors, and your students. No one expects you to be a know-it-all (and how annoying would you be if you were!). Model the principle of life long learning by being willing to change, adapt, adjust, and be vulnerable to your group. Remember that techniques alone are not what makes for a transformative teacher. The more you let your life speak through your teaching, the more your students will respond in kind.

Jay Roberts
Asst. Professor, Education
Director, Wilderness Programs
Earlham College

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Supervising the 'hired hands,' Un-supervising the 'professionals'

If an outdoor professional is at the same time “a hired hand” and “master of one’s fate”, how does an organization manage this paradox? How is it possible to ‘supervise’ the ‘hired hand’, yet ‘un-supervise’ to allow flexibility and judgment?

“Hired hand” and “master of one’s fate”

Professionalism, writes Robert Kegan in his book In Over Our Heads (1998), can be expressed as serving simultaneously in the position of “hired hand” and “master of one’s fate”.

This definition works well for our purposes, in that it captures the paradox inherent in guiding adventure trips or leading outdoor education. In essence, Kegan argues a ‘professional’ reaches a certain point of realization and maturity where these two opposing ideas can be balanced: working for someone else and doing as instructed (“hired hand”) and at the same time following one’s own ethical guidelines and doing what an individual believes to be right (“master of one’s fate”). This, he implies, is not a ‘rules versus judgment’ argument, but a ‘rules and judgment’ argument.

Hite (2000), in explaining this concept for the outdoor industry, wrote:

In this job the employer requires me to go out on a mountain ridge with clients, yet fully expects me to gauge the situation on the fly and improvise measures to both ensure safety and provide a very high quality service. If I cannot understand that I am at once an employee and yet also a free agent who incorporates in his judgment the essence of the job, I am going to be quite confused by the essentially unsupervised aspects of outdoor guiding.

Further, Kegan (1998) writes:

It may well be that the capacity… to hold onto two different conceptions of power and authority within one work relationship is a capacity people would want to associate with their concept of ‘professionalism’. (p. 158)

What is relevant for this paper is not the definition of ‘professionalism’, but instead the “two different conceptions of power and authority”. Accepting that one of those authorities is the individual’s ethics and judgment (master of one’s fate), the other power is that of the organization, that which hired and directs the ‘professional’. How, then, is it possible to ‘supervise’ the ‘hired hand’, yet ‘un-supervise’ the professional to allow flexibility and judgment? How is the balance between rules and judgment established, maintained, and monitored?

Hired hands and professionals: supervision expectations

Marsick and Watkins (1990) identify three channels of learning for and in the workplace: (figure 1)

Learning / training	Defined by:	For example:
Formal	Structured schooling or training	Outdoor Recreation Degree, WFR
Informal	Self directed, career or skill related	Skill development, expeditions, reading manuals, practicing
Incidental	Unplanned lessons	Solving challenging problems, co-instructing with peers

Figure 1: Learning opportunities in the workplace (Marsick and Watkins, 1990)

The first two of these learning opportunities, formal and informal training, could be considered ‘paths’ to becoming an outdoor professional. For example, the Outdoor Recreation Degree graduate (formal training) who goes on to work for an outdoor education centre; or conversely the self taught sea kayaker (informal training) who goes on to become a guide, based on their experience and skill. The third learning opportunity, incidental learning, is woven into the first two, but is more importantly a vital learning tool that stands on its own once an individual is established in the workplace.

The graduate and the sea kayaker will have fundamentally different supervision expectations based on their path into the industry. Formal training is based on a traditional academic model, which mandates individual study based on research and ‘expert’ opinion. Success is measured by the ability to excel within specified parameters. On the other hand, informal learning is pursued at the discretion of the individual, in any or many directions, and is based on trial and error (figure 2).

Learning / training	Learning characterized by:	Overheard saying:	Risk tolerance influenced by:	Supervision expectations
Formal	Autonomy/ isolation	“We’re in this together, but I’m on my own.”	Expert opinion	Parameters
Informal	Personal directed	“I’m on my own.”	Trial and error	Minimal interference
Incidental	Collabor-ation	“We’re in this together.”	Peers	Collaboration

Figure 2: Key characteristics of each learning path

This paper contends that within broad stereotypes, the individual’s training shapes their supervision expectations. Just as every individual has a preferred learning style, so they will have a preferred supervision style, one that will be based, at least in part, on their experience in gaining professional skills. Those from a formal background prefer supervision based on parameters and clear expectations indicating successful completion (much like the environment in which they were trained). Informal, self directed learners expect minimal interference from a supervisor, and an opportunity to set individual goals and create room for trail and error experimentation (as they learned).

Supervision models by default

The above argument implies, then, that there must be different supervision models.

First, the scope of the term ‘supervisor’ for this argument’s sake is useful, although not specific. Lead guide, trip leader, or head instructor could be considered a ‘front line’ supervisor, directly overseeing other staff in the delivery of the product. Program managers, coordinators, or directors could also be supervisors, perhaps at a level removed from the clientele and at a more macro level compared to the trip leader. The emphasis of this paper concerns the management level of supervision, with some application to field supervisors.

In the outdoor industry, the delivery level supervisors and the management level supervisors almost exclusively come from the field, having worked their way up the ranks from field staff to course leader to program manager (an exception to this rule could be an academic based program where supervisors come from other management areas with perhaps little direct knowledge of the product being delivered). This offers several advantages – the supervisor knows the staff, clientele, environment, trip/course outcomes, progression and procedures – but at the same time offers one major drawback: supervisors promoted from the field rarely have the necessary skills to effectively manage staff. With the promotion often comes minimal training, maximum challenge, and higher risk of burn out.

While this is not the forum to inventory the requisite skills for effective supervision, without thorough training in the new role the new supervisor will, by default, either supervise others in the way they prefer to be supervised (based partly on their formal/informal path and expectations), or supervise in a hierarchical and directive fashion. Either of these options may or may not work, depending on the background and expectations of the staff being supervised.

Supervising based on the supervised

Supervisors need to know and adapt to meet different expectations of the staff they are supervising. Supervising staff is all about the staff, and helping them be successful at the task at hand. The supervisor, therefore, is only an enabler, who relates the parameters or expectations to the individuals who will fulfill the task. For newer staff, this is typically a more directive approach than would be taken with an experienced individual, making allowance for the discussion above.

Supervisors need to continue to adapt to maturing staff. Regardless of the ‘path’ into the industry, experience inevitably leads to incidental learning opportunities (Marsick and Watkins, 1990), with long time staff relying heavily on incidental learning to progress in their skill development (figure 3). An example of this would be degree program graduate (position 1 in figure 3) who relies heavily on their formal training when they start their work in the field. As their experience grows and time passes, informal and incidental learning are incorporated into their judgment base and their formal training takes on a less prominent role in their decision making (position 2 in figure 3). Supervisors need to be aware of this transfer, and adapt their supervising to a more collegial style, that is working with the individual, rather than telling them what to do (refer to figure 2) (Marsick and Watkins, 1999).

Supervisors can play a key role in the professional development of staff by facilitating this transition towards incidental learning. Teschner and Wolter (1990) outline five benefits of this learning to the outdoor organization, which revolve around personal growth, which may be “intrinsically more important to staff than pay and other benefits”, less risk of burn out, and a higher functioning organization. The writers assert “If we want our programs to achieve the highest level possible, we must constantly act to ensure that our staff achieves their highest levels.”

Does there need to be a supervisor? Prove it.

This is perhaps the most valuable question an organization can ask itself. Why, exactly, does there need to be some ‘higher’ level of authority than the front line guides? The answer will likely include some or all of the following:

□ to ensure consistency in meeting organizational outcomes

□ to ensure client satisfaction

□ to ensure risk management procedures are adhered to

□ to coordinate multiple logistical elements required for delivery

□ for professional development of staff

Prioritize the above list from most to least important, and the solution to ‘supervising’ the ‘hired hand’ and ‘un-supervising’ the professional starts to take shape. Clearly, the highest organizational (and supervisor’s) priorities are the ones that require the most attention, direction and supervision. If risk management is the key role of the supervisor, then it is appropriate to dictate to staff how risk management should be dealt with (supervising the hired hand). However, if this aspect is secondary to consistency in meeting organizational outcomes, then large areas of risk management should be left to the judgment of the trained and experienced guide (master of one’s fate), while more direction is offered in ensuring consistency.

Within the reasonable assumption of staff adequately trained for their role and certain ‘guidelines’ being in place that all staff must follow (i.e. standard procedures regarding consistency, client satisfaction, and risk management), an implicit assumption is made that not all areas of a guided trip or outdoor education can be supervised from an administrative point of view. Indeed, what is the purpose of the organization? In matters dealing with this core value, all staff could be considered ‘hired hands’, whose purpose is to deliver that value to the client. In the surrounding matters (such as perhaps logistics or risk management), staff must be considered professionals. Sorting through the hyperbole of mission statements and asking “But what do we really do?” may offer some assistance in defining this core value, and hence the supervisor’s key role.

The trip leader, then, plays the role of intermediary, and that individual’s experience and familiarity with the program is trusted to fill the unsupervised gaps – letting the professionals do their thing.

Re-thinking the supervision tools of the outdoor professional

Omitting the discussion of effective supervision and leadership in the field (well covered by other authors, and rightly so as it is worthy of great attention from an organizational point of view), and considering instead the administrative supervisor’s role, some ‘standard’ supervision tools are utilized to shape what goes on in the field: logbooks or trip reports, pre and post trip briefings, client feedback forms, and staff manuals, among others. Any and all of these may have their place within the organization; however their effectiveness as a supervision tool may be overly optimistic (figure 4).

The emphasis of any supervision tool should complement the organization’s and supervisor’s priorities. Ideally, the organization’s training is so thorough and procedures so seamless, that supervision becomes a formality to ensure the system is working.

Supervision tool	Intended use	Realistic application	Appropriate for:	Does not:
Logbook / trip report	Documentation, opportunity to reflect	Not kept diligently, rushed	Factual documentation	Address ‘why?’ or promise reflection
Pre-trip briefing	Set goals, relate expectations	Same	All applications	Ensure follow through
Post trip debrief	Evaluate goals, critique decisions	‘Incriminating’ information omitted by staff	Discussion of events and decisions, sharing views	Relate complexity of situation, relate discussion to action
Client feedback	Ensure quality of delivery	Client view overly positive or negative, depending on personal experience	Understanding client perspective	Provide realistic perspective on staff performance
Field visits	Ensure expectations being met, guidelines followed	Staff ‘on best behaviour’	Client relations, program development	Ensure follow through
Staff meetings	Share information	Generic, non-targeted information w/o personal context	Delivering information quickly	Ensure personal reflection or ensure follow through

Figure 4: Administrative supervision tools for not-in-the-field supervisors

Conclusion

In staff management, Watters (1990) writes “finding the right people is not the problem. Rather, the challenge… is dealing with the over-enthusiastic and eventually over-worked employee.” Motivating the staff is typically not the issue; motivating them to do things a certain way, follow certain guidelines, and meet certain outcomes sometimes is.

Effective supervision becomes a balance between knowing and adapting to the individual’s supervision expectations (which changes over time) and meeting organizational priorities. Any two individuals will be treated differently. Any supervision tools must be thought out as to how they meet established priorities and apply to the individual. Staff can be considered hired hands regarding key organizational values, and treated as professionals to fill in the gaps using their training and judgment.

References

Hite, M. (2000) You are professional, so stop acting that way. Unpublished paper.

Kegan, R. (1998) In Over Our Heads., Boston, Harvard University Press.

Marsick, V. and Watkins, K. (1990) Informal and incidental learning in the workplace. London, Routledge.

Marsick, V. and Watkins, K. (1999) Facilitating learning organizations: making learning count. Gower, Aldershot.

Teschner, D. and Wolter, J. (1990) Beyond Minimum Competencies: toward an integrated model of staff growth and development, in Miles, J., and Priest, S., Adventure Education. State College, Venture Publishing, pp. 275-283.

Watters, R. (1990) Management and Administration of Outdoor Programs, in Miles, J., and Priest, S., Adventure Education. State College, Venture Publishing, pp. 269-273.

Are You Managing Post-Trip Safety?

The recent death of a student wilderness therapy program has been linked to an insect-borne disease. Many of these diseases like West Nile Virus, Lyme Disease, and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever may not show up until weeks, even months after exposure on your program. Will the participant think to relate her current symptoms back to an exposure to a mosquito or tick bite from months earlier?

So what can you do to increase the likelihood that the participant (or staff member) will seek out proper medical care? This is where post-trip information is an important part of your risk management follow-up. On programs at Princeton University, we send out a post-trip safety briefing on possible infectious diseases to educate and remind both participants and staff about what to look for.

The information below is what we send out after trips. You can use this as a template to develop your own post-trip information sheet. Depending on the part of the world your program(s) are operating in, the particular diseases and symptoms you need to inform people about may be very different.

After your Trip

We hope that you had an exciting and enjoyable time in the wilderness on yourt rip. After you've gotten a shower and washed your clothes, there are a few important pieces of information you need to be aware of. All outdoor travelers may come in contact with things during the trip that can lead to illnesses later on. Typically, the signs and symptoms of these illnesses don't become apparent until after your trip is over, so it is important that you be able to recognize them. Should you experience some of the symptoms noted below after your trip, go to the Health Center and describe your symptoms to a practitioner or see your own physician. Be sure to inform the health practitioner about your backcountry trip since they may not initially identify the proper cause of the illness without knowing about your wilderness trip. Most of these illnesses can be treated effectively using antibiotics, as long as you go for treatment promptly. For more information on any of these, see the Centers for Disease Control Web site (www.cdc.gov).

Water-borne Infections

Giardia: Giardiasis refers to a syndrome of diarrhea, excess gas, and abdominal cramping. It is caused by Giardia lamblia, a water-borne parasite that is worldwide in distribution. The symptoms usually occur one to two weeks after exposure to the parasite. Symptoms initially include diarrhea, bloating, nausea, abdominal cramping, and malaise. Weight loss is also a frequent finding. Backcountry travelers usually contract giardiasis by drinking water from untreated or improperly treated sources. Chemical treatment of the water and commercial water filtration systems, used properly, eradicate the parasite. The diagnosis of giardiasis can be confirmed by inspecting a stool sample for the presence of the parasite. Because this test may not always identify the organism even if it is present, a physician may elect to treat you empirically for the infection. The use of an appropriate antibiotic for seven days is usually highly effective in relieving symptoms and curing the disease.

Cryptosporidium: Cryptosporidium is a protozoan that causes a diarrheal illness similar to Giardia. Symptoms include watery diarrhea, headache, abdominal cramps, nausea, vomiting, and low-grade fever that may appear 2 to 10 days after infection. Some infected people will be asymptomatic. Currently, there is no effective treatment for Cryptosporidium. Symptoms usually last 1 to 2 weeks, at which time the body's immune system is able to stop the infection. People with normal immune systems are generally not at risk and improve without taking antibiotics or antiparasitic medications. For people with compromised immune systems this can be a dangerous disease. Please see your physician.

Cyclospora: Cyclospora is a recently discovered cause of diarrhea. It can cause a prolonged illness (average 6 weeks) with profound fatigue, loss of appetite, and intermittent diarrhea. Cyclospora can be treated with antibiotics. If you develop these symptoms, consult your physician.

Tick-borne Diseases

Lyme Disease: Lyme disease is an infection caused by a spiral shaped bacterium called a spirochete. This bacterium is carried in the gut of the deer tick Ixodes dammini. The tick becomes infected after feeding on the blood of an infected animal. Once infected, the tick can transmit the disease to its next host. Deer ticks are extremely small, with tick nymphs being about the size of the period at the end of this sentence. This means that you may have been bitten without realizing it. The tick needs to feed for an extended period of time (8-12 hours) before infection can occur. So just because you have found a tick does not mean that you have been infected. It is also possible that the tick was not carrying the disease.

Detecting Lyme Disease can be difficult to identify in the early stages as the early symptoms--fever, headache, stiffness, lethargy, and a myriad of other mild complaints, are often dismissed as the flu. In some cases (25%), there is a red, ring-like rash that occurs at the site of the bite. The rash is often referred to as a "bull's eye" rash because it has a white center surrounded by a red ring. Most typically, the rash expands and then fades within a few weeks after the bite. There is a blood test for Lyme Disease, but it is not perfect. The test generally produces positive results in the later stages of the disease but often turns up false negative results in the early stages of infection. Therefore, diagnosis in the early phase is frequently based on symptoms and the likelihood of a deer tick bite. Early detection means early treatment when the disease is most effectively controlled with antibiotics. Lyme disease can result in more serious symptoms if left untreated.

Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever: This disease is carried by a bacterium and can be transmitted by the bites of dog or wood ticks. Contrary to what the name of the disease suggests, it can be found throughout the U.S. Watch for mild chills, appetite loss, and a general run-down feeling. These symptoms may worsen to sever chills, fever, headaches, muscle and bone pain, and sensitivity to light. Also, a spotty red rash may appear (hence the name) usually starting at the wrists and ankles and spreading over the rest of the body. Normal onset of these symptoms is anywhere between 3 and 14 days, so anyone bitten by a tick should be aware of the disease, as it may not present itself until the trip is over. Untreated, the mortality rate is 20 to 30%. Anyone who shows these signs should seek medical attention as soon as possible.

Ehrlichiosis: Ehrlichiosis is a recently recognized tick-borne disease caused by a bacterium. The disease is similar to Rocky Mountain spotted fever and can be life threatening. The most common symptoms are sudden high fever, tiredness, major muscle aches, severe headache, and, in some cases, a rash (similar to the symptoms of Lyme Disease). Symptoms usually appear 3 to 16 days after a tick bite. The same ticks that carry Lyme Disease can also transmit Ehrlichiosis at the same time. Without treatment Ehrlichiosis can be fatal. Ehrlichiosis can be treated with the same antibiotic used to treat Lyme Disease. Anyone who shows these signs should seek medical attention as soon as possible.

Tick Paralysis: A number of species of ticks can transmit tick paralysis. It is not an infection, but a by-product of venom in the tick's saliva that is secreted while the tick is attached. Symptoms are unsteady movement and gait (ataxia) and ascending paralysis starting in the lower extremities and moving up. Paralysis can cause loss of respiratory drive, requiring CPR and immediate evacuation. Once the tick is removed, the source of the venom is gone and the patient generally recovers completely. Children are more likely to be affected than adults. Any patient with an ascending paralysis should be carefully checked for an attached tick.

Tularemia: Tularemia, or rabbit fever, is a bacterial disease of which the most common carriers are rabbits, although it can also be transmitted by ticks. The disease presents with flu-like symptoms and can be treated with antibiotics.

Mosquito-borne Diseases

West Nile Virus: West Nile virus (WNV) is a potentially serious illness that is transmitted by the bite of some mosquitoes. WNV affects the central nervous system. Symptoms vary.
No Symptoms in Most People. Approximately 80 percent of people who are infected with WNV will not show any symptoms at all.
Mild Symptoms in Some People. Up to 20 percent of the people who become infected will display mild symptoms, including fever, headache, and body aches, nausea, vomiting, and sometimes swollen lymph glands or a skin rash on the chest, stomach and back. Symptoms typically last a few days.
Serious Symptoms in a Few People. About one in 150 people infected with WNV will develop severe illness. The severe symptoms can include high fever, headache, neck stiffness, stupor, disorientation, coma, tremors, convulsions, muscle weakness, vision loss, numbness and paralysis. These symptoms may last several weeks, and neurological effects may be permanent.

Outdoor Industry Foundation releases Outdoor Recreation Participation Study for 2005

Outdoor Industry Foundation (OIF) announced today the availability of its most recent Outdoor Recreation Participation Study. According to this study, 161.6 million Americans, aged 16 and older, participated in at least one of 22 active outdoor activities tracked in the study during 2005.

"Outdoor Industry Foundation is pleased to announce the availability of the 2006 Outdoor Recreation Participation Study," said Michelle Barnes, Foundation Vice-President. "The study shows that Americans' participation in active outdoor recreation remains strong. Despite concerns that the severe weather of 2005 would hinder outdoor recreation, participation did not decline; in fact 2 million more Americans got outdoors and got active last year."

This is the 8th edition of the annual report, which tracks nationwide participation levels for Americans ages 16 and older in 22 active outdoor activities. OIF began tracking participation in 1998 measuring 13 core activities including: backpacking; bicycling on paved roads, dirt, and single track bicycling; car camping and camping away from car; canoeing; cross country/Nordic skiing; hiking; rafting; snowshoeing; Telemark skiing; and trail running. Since the study began, OIF has added 9 additional activities including: bird watching; climbing on natural rock; artificial wall climbing; ice climbing; fly-fishing; non-fly fishing; sit-on-top kayaking; touring/sea kayaking; and whitewater kayaking. For the first time in 2005, participation data for hunting and motorized off-road activities was also collected.

Key Findings

While participation increased across the 22 outdoor activities from 159 million Americans age 16 and older in 2004 to 161.6 million in 2005, outings decreased by 11%. In 2005, Americans 16 and older took a total of 7.3 billion outings compared to 8.3 billion outings in 2004. Bicycling and fishing accounted for the bulk of that decline, with an approximate 800,000 and 300,000 outing decrease respectively. Despite that, both these sports ranked among the top five for most outings in 2005: bicycling (3.1 billion), trail running (1.3 billion), fishing (1 billion), hiking (800 million), and camping (347 million). The median number of total annual outings (all activities) declined from 51 in 2004 to 45 in 2005, and the majority of people participated only one to two times during the year.

Overnight backpacking's dramatic 22.5% decline in participation over the past eight year period and the significant increase in snowshoeing (83%) and trail running (22%) participation indicate that individuals are looking for less commitment-heavy activities. Instead, activities that can be done occasionally and without great planning effort seem to be on the rise.

"The Outdoor Recreation Participation Study confirms trends that emerged last year: participants are focusing on low-commitment activities, especially those that can be done in a day, in locations near their homes and with limited technical equipment," commented Barnes. "The industry will benefit from focusing on this type of outdoor recreation as gateways to higher-commitment outdoor activities."

In 2005, there were a number of notable weather events in the U.S. -- hurricanes in the South Central region, bitter cold winter in the Northeast, late snow in the Midwest, no snow in the Pacific Northwest, and good snow in the southern Rockies. This weather was likely a contributing factor to both changes in participation and outings: in 2004, biking participants took an average of 45 outings compared to 36 outings in 2005, possibly kept away by a strong hurricane season and bitter cold; sit-on-top kayaking increased 34.4% from 2003 and 22.4% from 2004, helped by full rivers from the heavy snow run-off; fly-fishing declined 19.9% in 2005 when too much snow run-off and a bad hurricane season made conditions less than desirable.

Outdoor/adventure vacations continued to grow in popularity and within that category, water-sport vacations are increasing. In 2005, one in four Americans 16 and older (59.5 million) took a vacation specifically to participate in an outdoor activity. Top vacation outdoor activities include: swimming (20%), hiking/backpacking (18%), fishing (14%) and camping vacations (14%). More Americans are participating in water-sports vacations such as swimming in 2005 (20%) than in 2003 (15%). Participation in camping vacations is also greater in 2005 (14%) than it was in 2003 (11%). The baby-boomers are making their mark on outdoor/adventure travel -- one-third of active travelers are over the age of 45.

Participation in outdoor activities by young adults and women is watched closely in this annual study. In 2005, 86.5% of American young adults between the ages of 16 and 24 participated in tracked activities. These young adults took 21.7 billion total outings in 2005 and participated in an average of 4.2 different activities. Total outings per young adult have declined from 68 average outings annually in 2004 to 60 outings in 2005. As for women, participation among female Americans ages 16 and older remained stable from 2004 (63.7% or 73.2 million American women) to 2005 (64.2% or 74.5 Million American women). Like young adults, however, female participants, on average, took fewer outings in 2005 (28.4) than in 2004 (38.3).

A full copy of the Outdoor Recreation Participation Study, which was produced for OIF by The Leisure Trends Group, can be downloaded from the OIF website at: http://www.outdoorindustryfoundation.org/.

Download a copy of the Participation Study quick facts at: http://www.outdoorindustryfoundation.org/pdf/ParticipationStudyQuickFacts2006.pdf

About Outdoor Industry Foundation

Outdoor Industry Foundation (OIF) is a non-profit foundation established by Outdoor Industry Association to encourage active outdoor recreation for all Americans. OIF's charter is to increase participation in outdoor recreation and to encourage and support healthier active lifestyles. Through education, partnerships, programs and advocacy, OIF is working to make active outdoor recreation the number one leisure activity in America. We invite you to join us on this important mission by making a long term commitment to the health of our industry, our public lands, and our nation. For more information go to http://www.outdoorindustryfoundation.org/ or call 303.444.3353.

Why do we do it? The Psychology of Risk

Lessons Learned II: A Guide to Accident Prevention & Crisis Response

Chapter One

Adam’s Story

By Kay Landis, with assistance from Phil Dzialo

Chapter One is a case study of a 1998 near-drowning incident involving 12-year-old Adam Dzialo. The account includes pre- and post-incident actions along with the perspective of the boy’s parents on the years that stretched between the original accident and a final settlement with the state of Massachusetts. The information is intended to help readers understand the effects that a serious accident and post-incident response can have on family members and loved ones. It also offers a good example of how different audiences can have different understandings of such concepts as negligence and inherent risk.

Chapter Two

Chuck’s Story

By Deb Ajango, with assistance from Chuck Bonning

Chapter Two follows Chuck Bonning from the summit of Mount McKinley through a harrowing descent, high-altitude bivouac, and helicopter rescue to the hospital where he was treated for extensive frostbite. Chuck and his wife provide survivors’ insights into what it took to endure and, ultimately, find meaning in the experience. Throughout the narrative, they also reflect on what went wrong and what went right before, during, and after the storm that changed their lives.

Chapter Three

Risk Management Planning: A Closer Look

By Deb Ajango

Chapter Three provides an assessment of the risk management strategies used by the programs involved in Chapter One and Chapter Two. By comparing Greenfield Community College’s and Alaska Denali Guiding’s operating procedures to the 10 components of a risk management system, the author is able to identify some of the less obvious aspects of risk management, including mistakes that service providers sometimes make.

Chapter Four

Creating a Workable Emergency Action Plan

By Deb Ajango

Chapter Four examines the key components of an emergency action plan (EAP), from the philosophical concepts that will be used to drive the plan to the detailed steps included in its implementation. By using a variety of case studies—starting with the University of Alaska Anchorage’s response following a 1997 mountaineering accident—the author not only identifies measures unique to a quality EAP, but she also offers ideas on why seemingly well-crafted EAPs sometimes fail.

Chapter Five

In the Path of the Ripple: The Effects of a Tragedy on a Program’s Employees

By Deb Ajango

Chapter Five includes accounts and insights from trip leaders and program managers who have lived through serious program-related incidents involving participants. Starting with Kate Douglas’s experience at Greenfield Community College, the chapter outlines some of the many challenging, frustrating, surprising, and healing aspects of their experiences.

Chapter Six

Managing the Risks of a Lawsuit

By Charles “Reb” Gregg

Chapter Six examines risk management from a legal perspective. By using the Chapter One and Chapter Two case studies as teaching points, the author describes a variety of pre-trip preparations, in-the-field actions, and post-incident responses that affect the outfitter-participant relationship and can either increase or decrease an outfitter’s exposure to the risk of a lawsuit.

Chapter Seven

Understanding “How Accidents Happen” in Outdoor Pursuits

By Drew Leemon

Chapter Seven explores the current state of thinking on how accidents happen in outdoor adventure activities. The author explains several methods for analyzing outdoor accidents and uses real case studies to demonstrate the practical application of these methods.

Chapter Eight

The Loss of Leadership in the Outdoor Industry

By Blaine Smith

Chapter Eight identifies how the outdoor industry has changed over the past two decades and offers insights into how this transformation has created significant challenges for field staff and program managers. While the author acknowledges that some of the current trends seem to be working against the industry, he ends the chapter by offering a number of ideas for enhancing the quality and professionalism of today's aspiring leaders.

Chapter Nine

The Role of Perception, Genes, and Culture on Risky Behaviors

By Jerry Dzugan

Chapter Nine takes a look at the roots of risky behavior and addresses the question: Are potentially unsafe actions the result of ignorance, experience, or genetics? The second half of the chapter is used to give readers ideas on how program managers and industry leaders can modify an organization’s potentially unsafe behaviors.

The book will be available for purchase starting mid-October. It will be on sale at the Wilderness Risk Management Conference, Oct 27-29, in Snowbird,Utah and the Association for Experiential Education conference, November 3-6, in Tucson, Arizona.

To order contact Deb at debajango@att.net. The book will cost $22.00 for orders up to nine and cost $15.00 for orders of 10 or more. There will be a postage and handling fee of $3.00 each book (up to nine) and $2.00 per book for orders of 10 or more.

Deb Ajango is the owner and director of SafetyEd: Safety Education for Outdoor and Remote Work Environments. In her work with SafetyEd, Deb has provided consultation as well as conducted safety audits around the United States and overseas. She has spent more than 15 years working in outdoor education and has more than 2,000 days of field experience. Deb has presented at a variety of national symposiums and conferences. From 1997 to 2003, she was coordinator of the University of Alaska Anchorage’s academic outdoor education department. She is currently a member of the Association for Experiential Education’s Accreditation Council and is one of the coeditors of the 2005 Manual of Accreditation Standards for Adventure Programs. Deb is also editor and coauthor of Lessons Learned: A Guide to Accident Prevention and Crisis Response. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and a Master’s degree in Clinical Psychology, both from the University of Wisconsin Madison.

Backpacking Light Magazine Announces Winners of First Annual Lightitude Awards for the Outdoor Industry's BestLightweight Gear

Lightitude Awards Set a New Standard for Excellence in Lightweight Gear andApparel – GoLite, Cascade Designs, Garmin, Western Mountaineering, McNett,TarpTent, and Six Moon Designs Take Home Top Honors

Bozeman, Mont. - August 12, 2005 - Backpacking Light Magazine

(www.BackpackingLight.com), the industry’s leading consumer voice for lightweight backpacking trends, technique, and gear is pleased to announce the winners of the first annual 2005 Lightitude Awards. Winners were announced at the Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2005 in Salt Lake City, Utah on August 12. See the table below for complete list of award winners, products and reason for selection.

“Above all, this new award recognizes superior innovation and performance in product design for lightweight gear,” said Ryan Jordan, co-founder and publisher of Backpacking Light Magazine. “Lightweight backpackers have significant influence in shaping the industry as they continue to push the envelope of what humans can do on the trail. Not only do they spend more money on gear, but they use it, abuse it, and talk about it.” And talk about gear they did: a public community forum was opened at BackpackingLight.com for discussing all 174 pieces of gear nominated for the 2005 Lightitude Awards.

In response to the rapidly growing trend towards lighter gear in apparel in all outdoor sports, not just hiking and backpacking, Backpacking Light created the Lightitude Award to recognize those very few, but exceptional, pieces of gear that met the strictest criteria of maximum performance at minimum weight. “We are very excited to recognize these seven companies and their commitment to not only to designing and manufacturing high quality products, but to commend them on their commitment to the lightweight trend.” said Ryan.

Lightweight backpacking is a healthy and growing trend. Backpacking Light Magazine's demographic research indicates that of the approximately two million backpacking “enthusiasts” (those who spend more than 10 days per year backpacking, according to the Outdoor Industry Association), 360,000 – or more – are actively practicing a holistic approach to lightweight backpacking, regularly carrying less than 20 pounds of gear (less food and water) into the backcountry. The top 10 percent of this group spends an average of $1,000 on lightweight backpacking gear, translating to $36 million in generated revenue for the lightweight gear industry. As more outdoor enthusiasts discover the benefits, comfort, and safety of going lighter and faster, Backpacking Light expects this number to grow significantly in the coming years.

Backpacking Light received 174 nominations from qualified outdoor professionals and backcountry core users. Unlike other magazine awards which seek out “cool new gear,” the Lightitude Awards committee would only accept nominations for products that had previously been on the market for a significant period of time and available to the public.

The nominations were then subjected to the court of public opinion in an open community forum at BackpackingLight.com, where users and industry professionals gave critical feedback about each product. “A magazine's editorial staff can only test so much gear,” said Ryan. “Input from the public, industry equipment designers, and outdoor professionals were absolutely critical to bringing integrity and authenticity to the award.” Following the public comment period, an award committee (consisting entirely of individuals who hold engineering degrees) individually and blindly rated each product. Only those products that received the very highest rating from each member of the committee were considered for a Lightitude Award. “The bottom line,” Ryan says, “is that by the time a product is honored with a Lightitude Award, it has stood up to the most rigorous review process in the industry today.”

“This award simply recognizes the best gear in the industry,” said Jordan. Of the 174 nominations, only eighteen were unanimously chosen to be worthy of the title, “Lightitude Award.” Seven gear manufacturers received the award and eleven others received honorable mentions for their products.

2005 Lightitude Award Winners:

Company
Product Category
Winning Solution

TarpTent
Squall 2
Best Single Wall Shelter

At 35 oz (including floor) for a two-person shelter that provides full weather and insect protection, wind stability, ventilation, easy setup, good views, plenty of room for two people – and their gear – with the ability for both to sit up, combined with beautiful aesthetics in design, the TarpTent Squall has set the standard for two person ultralight shelters for the past several years.

Six Moon Designs
Lunar Solo e
Best Solo Tent

The Six Moon Designs Lunar Solo e requires only a single trekking pole for setup, with good ventilation, insect protection, exceptional views, room to stretch out – and sit up – and a cavernous vestibule for storing gear or cooking a meal, all in a 23-ounce package unmatched by any solo tent on the market.

GoLite
Momentum Jacket
Best Soft Shell Apparel

Exceptional fit, a highly weather resistant – and breathable – fabric, and aesthetics that reflect simplicity and elegance of design, make the 13-oz GoLite Momentum Jacket the most functional lightweight soft shell on the market.

Western Mountaineering
Flight Vest
Best Insulating Apparel

At only 5.5 ounces, the Western Mountaineering Flight Vest offers two inches of loft with the market’s highest quality down, a weather resistant microfiber shell that doesn’t leak plumes, and design purity that reflects the garment’s ability to perform a core function that no other piece of apparel can claim: maximum warmth-to-weight ratio.

Cascade Designs
Platypus Bottles
Best Hydration Accessory

Eliminating extraneous features that add unnecessary weight is the strength of Cascade Designs’ Platypus Bottle line: they perform the simple task of holding water at less weight than any other product on the market, collapse to pocketable sizes, and remain durable enough for a thru-hike.

McNett
Aqua Mira
Best Water Treatment Technology

The new gold standard in ultralight chemical water treatment technologies, McNett Aqua Mira is backed by sound science, is utterly simple to use, remains pocketable for easy access while on the trail, provides safe drinking water in a matter of minutes, and best of all, creates drinking water untainted by the foul tastes of other chemical methods.

Garmin
Geko 301
Best Navigation Device

No other GPS is as small, or as light, and offers so many of the essential features required of a hiking and backpacking GPS, as the Garmin Geko 301: magnetic compass integrated with GPS electronics, barometric altimeter, PC interface, one-handed use requiring minimal button pushing to perform necessary functions, customizable displays, and a truly pocketable form factor.

Honorable mentions include:

Pentax Optio WP Digital Camera
Komperdell Carbon TourDuolock Trekking Poles
Photon Freedom LED Microlight
SnowClaw Backcountry Snow Shovel
Ushba Altai Titanium Ice Axe
Integral Designs South Col Bivy Sack
Gossamer Gear NightLight Torso Pad (Torso Length)
Big Sky Products Evolution 2P Shelter
Grivel Air Tech Light Crampons
Northern Lites Backcountry Snowshoes
Suunto X6 Altimeter Watch

Award winners were presented with personalized plaques etched with the Backpacking Light Lightitude Award logo and features the winner's company logo and product name. Transparent plaques were suspended from a carbon fiber frame with Spectra cord and mounted on Pennsylvania Blue Sandstone, the characteristic rock of the Appalachian Trail's most difficult state.

For complete product descriptions and to learn why each product was chosen, please visit www.backpackinglight.com.

About Backpacking Light

Backpacking Light Magazine (www.BackpackingLight.com) is the outdoor industry’s most recognized and authoritative voice for wilderness travel philosophy, techniques and gear. Catering primarily to prosumer and industry professional audiences, Backpacking Light technical articles and product reviews are based on accurate and trustworthy investigative research. In addition, Backpacking Light publishes content for beginning and novice wilderness travelers to help them go light while staying safe and comfortable in the backcountry. Backpacking Light offers two primary subscription-based products, including a print magazine of exceptional shelf quality (Backpacking Light, ISSN 1550-4417) and a comprehensive online magazine (BackpackingLight.com, ISSN 1537-0364) that features articles, reviews, gear guides, reader forums, and a members’ co-op-style gear shop that features some of the quirkiest and coolest ultralight gear on the planet. Backpacking Light Magazine is also the publisher of the critically-acclaimed book, Lightweight Backpacking & Camping (ISBN 0-9748188-2-8), announced on August 11 at the 2005 Outdoor Retailer Summer Market in Salt Lake City.

# # #

Media Contact:

Bridget Cavanaugh 406-522-8075 bmc@oberrycavanaugh.com

Outdoor Ed - Articles on Outdoor Education

Outdoor Sports Injury Prevention

Experiential Education: A Fragile and Incomplete Project

Introduction

Alvin: Part One

On Democracy and Democratic Living

Alvin’s Story: Part 2

Fragile

Incomplete

Alvin’s Story: Part 3

Conclusion

Bear Safety and Defense--Important Do's and Don'ts

Teaching in the Outdoors: A Primer

Supervising the 'hired hands,' Un-supervising the 'professionals'

Are You Managing Post-Trip Safety?

After your Trip

Water-borne Infections

Tick-borne Diseases

Mosquito-borne Diseases

Outdoor Industry Foundation releases Outdoor Recreation Participation Study for 2005

Why do we do it? The Psychology of Risk

Lessons Learned II: A Guide to Accident Prevention & Crisis Response

Adam’s Story

Chuck’s Story

Risk Management Planning: A Closer Look

Creating a Workable Emergency Action Plan

In the Path of the Ripple: The Effects of a Tragedy on a Program’s Employees

Managing the Risks of a Lawsuit

Understanding “How Accidents Happen” in Outdoor Pursuits

The Loss of Leadership in the Outdoor Industry

The Role of Perception, Genes, and Culture on Risky Behaviors

Backpacking Light Magazine Announces Winners of First Annual Lightitude Awards for the Outdoor Industry's BestLightweight Gear

Lightitude Awards Set a New Standard for Excellence in Lightweight Gear andApparel – GoLite, Cascade Designs, Garmin, Western Mountaineering, McNett,TarpTent, and Six Moon Designs Take Home Top Honors

2005 Lightitude Award Winners:

TarpTentSquall 2 Best Single Wall Shelter

Six Moon DesignsLunar Solo e Best Solo Tent

GoLiteMomentum JacketBest Soft Shell Apparel

Western Mountaineering Flight Vest Best Insulating Apparel

Cascade DesignsPlatypus Bottles Best Hydration Accessory

McNettAqua Mira Best Water Treatment Technology

GarminGeko 301 Best Navigation Device

TarpTent
Squall 2
Best Single Wall Shelter

Six Moon Designs
Lunar Solo e
Best Solo Tent

GoLite
Momentum Jacket
Best Soft Shell Apparel

Western Mountaineering
Flight Vest
Best Insulating Apparel

Cascade Designs
Platypus Bottles
Best Hydration Accessory

McNett
Aqua Mira
Best Water Treatment Technology

Garmin
Geko 301
Best Navigation Device