For many students at Bowdoin, their outdoor experience will consist of an Outing Club trip, a few runs in the Brunswick Commons and, if they’re lucky, a trip to hike Mount Katahdin. But for students who seek more immersive outdoor experiences, the Bowdoin Outing Club (BOC) offers Leadership Training (LT) and its subgroup, Out of the Zone (OZ).
LT courses are offered in the fall, winter and spring.
According to the BOC webpage, LT participants are required to complete over 350 hours of lecture, demonstration and fieldwork to successfully complete the course and become certified to guide other students on trips.
The BOC was informally founded in 1963, when John McKee—who was a lecturer in art at the time—became the first official faculty advisor for the club. But there has been an unrelated, informal outdoor-oriented club since the 1920s, according to the BOC’s current president, Mike Woodruff ’87.
The BOC operated unofficially until 1983, when football Head Coach Jim Lentz presented the idea of the formal outing club that exists today. A year later, he resigned as football coach and became the club’s first president.
In 1992, Lentz retired and Woodruff took over as the Director of the BOC. Under Woodruff’s leadership, the BOC became more organized and LT was formalized, having previously been an unofficial group of students who went on weekend trips.
The Fall Leadership Training, which began in September and wrapped up this month, focused on sea kayaking skills. The Winter Leadership Training course takes place from January to March and concentrates on winter camping and mountaineering. The Spring Leadership Training is held from March to May, and emphasizes whitewater canoeing.
One chapter of the LT program is the “Out of the Zone” (OZ) leadership training group. The chapter began five years ago, after the Outing Club wanted to bring in trip leaders from diverse geographic and racial backgrounds.
OZ allows students more flexibility in their time commitment to the program, according to Rebecca Austin ’10, the Assistant Director of the Outing Club. Because many of the students who are in OZ have had little outdoor experience, training time is more spread out along the semester.
“We start at the basics with OZ, since many of the participants have never gone to the bathroom outside or had much experience with snow,” she said.
But despite the challenge, Austin enjoys the initiative and finds it useful.
“We want to diversify our leadership at the Outing Club, but also make what we do—and the fun stuff we do—accessible to everybody at Bowdoin,” she said.
There are a variety of reasons students give to explain why they chose to apply for LT and OZ.
Danny Mejia ’17 said his love of nature was his primary reasons for doing the program.
Stephen Kelly, also a first year, was always interested in LT.
“I applied because I think the Outing Club is one of the coolest things at Bowdoin,” Kelly said. “LT was a great way to spend time in gorgeous nature while also learning quite a bit.”
“With LT and OZ, our goal is to train student leaders for the Outing Club. We want to make sure they are prepared to lead trips for their peers,” said Austin.
While most LT trips are led by student leaders, one of the two directors accompanies the groups on more strenuous trips such as whitewater kayaking or mountain climbing, where having a more experienced leader may be necessary.
LT participants are immediately thrown into a leadership role out on their trips.
“The main thing we do is put LT participants in the role of being ‘leader of the day.’ They practice making all the decisions, and are charged with keeping the group warm, safe, fed and hydrated. At the end of the day, we debrief and go over the pros and cons of the decisions that they made,” said Austin.
For Kelly, acquiring new canoeing skills was the most enjoyable part of his LT experience.
“Steering challenged me much more than I expected it to and so I felt very satisfied once I became proficient at it,” he said.
Mejia said that despite the difficult schedule and heavy commitment, the programs was very enjoyable and he appreciated the close relationships he developed with other participants.
All LT classes are also required to return early to campus during Winter Break to complete a Wilderness First Responder (WFR) training course. This course—run by Wilderness medical Associates International—is eight days long.
“We do this with LT and OZ, and the wilderness medical associates who run the course for us. [The participants] learn CPR, first aid, how to administer an epinephrine pen, and much more,” said Austin. “They also learn to deal with asthma attacks and trauma. It’s way above and beyond basic first aid or Red Cross training.”
The number of applicants for this year’s courses was relatively stable when compared with last year’s applicant numbers.
The BOC received 40 applicants for the fall course and took 17. Winter and spring applicant numbers are expected to be similar.
Almost all the applicants were first years and sophomores.