I am looking for a training program for basic wilderness skills--not paramilitary training--for a 15 year old with almost no outdoors experience. Ideally a program of 10-14 days. I am impressed with information I have on the Outward Bound programs, but I am not experienced enough myself to make an informed decision. Any help would be GREATLY appreciated. Thanks<br>Robb

Tell him to join the Green Berets? ;-)<br><br>I suppose, as with any personal ad, it would help if you gave an indication what part of the country you're in. Even if the student is prepared to travel, a Wilderness Training School is likely to focus on what's available locally. A school in Northern Alberta is likely to have a very different slant than one in Nevada, fritz ample. What sort of "Wilderness Training" are you looking for?<br><br>I've never taken any formal survival training, even when I was in the military; what little I know of it is mostly self-taught through books and the Internet, with a little practical thrown in. I co-taught a course for a group of St. John Ambulance cadets, in part because the other instructor (a friend of mine) used to teach wilderness survival to the Canadian Navy and I figured it was a good chance to pick his brains. <br><br>As far as I know, the Outward Bound schools have a good reputation, but I don't know anything about them. <br><br>A guy named Larry Dean Olsen, who wrote "Outdoor Survival Skills" (I have the sixth edition) used to run a Wilderness Survival program at BYU in Provo, Utah. I don't know if they still run it. I'd be a little leery of this, despite Olsen's impressive qualifications; according to his book, he almost died on one of his own training exercises, and the other instructor who "saved his life" was in desperate need of First Aid training. (Among other things, she gave water to Olsen while he was unconscious - a huge no-no - and she continued forcing him to drink even though he was vomiting.) Realism is all very well, but the instructors should carry HF radios for emergencies.<br><br>People might have a better response to your request if you said what part of the country you're interested in, does he want to do it locally or travel and see some exotic part of the country, etc.<br><br>Another alternative is that you can volunteer to set one up for the Boy Scouts and teach it yourself. Sometimes that's the best way to learn the skills yourself; it was for me. (Another thing you may want to consider - A lot of formal survival courses are based on the "One man against the Wilderness" concept, and may teach little or nothing about group survival; the course I co-taught last year, almost by necessity, put the students together in groups chosen by lot and forced them to work as a team. )

Robb, Outward Bound is a good program, but it is geared more to "character building" than the nuts and bolts ( knives and matches?) of wilderness training. As you may have gleened from past posts; survival schools often come with the baggage of personal philosophies, lifestyles etc. This isn't neccessarily bad, often fun, but they better deliver the goods first and foremost. Teaching bowdrill firemaking is good only if you understand which end of a match is which first. Let us know which area ( some of the basics do apply to arboreal and desert climes both) we are talking about. meanwhile, the many books and videos reviewed by Doug are a good start.

oops...sorry about that...a good idea to define the parameters. This is for a 15 year old girl who is an enthusiastic learner, but a real neophyte woodsman. We live in the rural upper midwest, but anywhere on the northern continent is fair game. Looking for camping/hiking/firebuilding/surviving in the woods(as opposed to desert). Excellent swimmer with canoe and sailing skills, so river/water would be a plus. Group dynamics would be a plus too and, of course, excellent, competent obsessive-like supervision. <br>Thanks much for the help!<br><br>Robb<br>

>>>Another alternative is that you can volunteer to set one up for the Boy Scouts...<<<<br><br>Actually, it was the lack of a good Scout program that led me to this forum. Two of our scouts last year signed up for Wilderness Survival merit badge at summer camp. Midway through the week, I was checking in with them on when they planned on doing their overnight in the shelter they had to build. They replied that they decided to drop the badge because the instructor wasn't teaching them anything. Of coarse, I brought this to the camp director's attention, but I learned two valuable lessons that day.<br><br>One, never underestimate the capacity of our children. These boys could have skated through the badge requirements with that staff and received the badge and patch. But they weren't doing it for the patch, they wanted the experience. I truly admire them for their honesty and integrity.<br><br>Two, that in any organization, one is going to find great variation in skill and capability. Hence, I've challenged the boys in our troop to earn this badge this summer. And I've committed myself to augmenting their experience from what I know, which is limited to mostly what I've learned through this site and related links & books. I'm no expert, but I hope I can move them in the right direction. (BTW, merit badges are mostly introductions into specific areas and are not training coarses. So one would not expect an scout to become an expert at wilderness survival from a 50 page pamphlet.)<br><br>There are a few palces that offer courses, I beleive a few are listed in the links Doug provides. But make sure you call and talk with them to make sure the course meets your expectations. Choose one that will address issues and skills that matter to you and your lifestyle. Taking a class intended for small plane pilots would be a waste of time and money if you don't fly, even though many of the skills apply to non-flying emergencies.<br><br>