Getting kids outside: One man's story

In 1997, when you founded BAWT, was there evidence suggesting that kids needed to be outdoors more?

I was not aware of much research; this effort is very much a result of my personal experience taking kids outdoors. I just knew intuitively that this is what was needed. I've been with kids who were 18 years old who were seeing the Milky Way for the first time. Things start to make sense in a different way — you can be humbled and sense that there might be opportunities out there that you never knew about.

What does BAWT do?

Our mission is to provide first-hand wilderness experience for urban youth. We do it by training youth workers and teachers and then providing them comprehensive support so that they can take the youth they work with into the wilderness. There's a couple of reasons why we do it that way. The first and most obvious reason is that we can get a heck of a lot more youth outdoors: By training adults we get 20 youth out for every adult we've trained. Last year we got 3,000 young people outdoors. If we were to do it ourselves, we could never do that.

With our model, we're training adults who are going to be with the kids on Monday. And the kids say, when can we go again? And the teachers can say, let's plan the trip together. That's how we let the trips have a long-term impact.

What kind of support do you provide educators?

Well, for instance, Mission Graduates has taken out hundreds of kids using our gear — we have three different gear libraries. They get tents, sleeping bags, backpacks; they can go snowshoeing, camping, or rafting. We have a Partnership with City CarShare, so they can use the BAWT van. We've also provided mini-grants for purchasing food and pay for gas and all the rest. All of those support systems can be combined for organizations that might not otherwise be able to pay for trips.

Do you work with at-risk youth in particular?

We do, but with the exception of our Camping at the Presidio program, we're not exclusive. What happens is, private schools have the resources to do these trips, so they don't bother with us. But the others don't have this gear. 85-90 percent of who we serve would be classified as at-risk youth.

Did you have a Eureka moment that made you think kids needed to be outdoors more?

I was teaching fourth grade in New Orleans as a Teach for America fellow, and in the summers I was a guide for the Appalachian Mountain Club. A youth group came through and I was one of the guides. It was on of the most powerful trips that I've taken with youth — we were on a rugged section on Appalachian Trail on a four-day trip. This experience was one when we were really immersed, really away from technology and the modern world. A bunch of things happened that made it a super powerful trip — we were getting rained on and trying to support one and another and we couldn't just go to the store to get more food.

I could see in these kids' faces and in their body language that being outdoors had made a huge difference. But I didn't know if it would create a lasting impact. My sense was that this could have been life changing for them, but I wouldn't know that until I got to see their life unfold thereafter. And that's the setup for most organizations that do this: you take them out and then you hope for the best. We train adults that have trusted relationships with these kids, who can provide a leadership experience in their own culture and their own language.

What can those of us who aren't teachers or youth workers do to support kids having outdoor experiences?

You can get involved through a program we have called Climbing for Kids. We have people sign up for mountaineering expedition and they raise a bunch of money to help us get kids outdoors. It's a challenge for a cause. In return, they get the climb of a lifetime and $1,500 worth of gear from our generous sponsors. You don't have to have experience; we'll coach you on what's the right mountain for you. We contract with guides who provide the on-mountain training that you do. Some people get to the top and some people don't. We like to say that people have their own personal summit.

The climb emulates the experience that the kids have: Kids who have never camped before, they're like Is a bear going to eat me?; they don't know that there are no bears on Mount Tam. The adults experience that same trepidation.