Serving Today's Youth
**Image courtesy of the Outward Bound Trust
During the COP26 climate conference in 2021, over 50,000 young people came from across the UK and the world to march through the streets of Glasgow calling for climate justice. Youth movements have increasingly brought young people into the rooms where those with power meet, but there is still an increasing gap between what young people and scientists know must be done to limit global heating and what the wealthiest nation states and corporations are actually doing.
OB UK exists to serve the young people of Britain, to inspire them to succeed and make them ready for the challenges of life. Thinking about the responsibility we bear to leave an environment fit for young people to inherit - and for us to continue to work in - inspired our decision to get to Net Zero by 2035 and our adoption of the OBI Environmental Charter, though those commitments built on work we had been already doing for some time.
We began measuring our carbon footprint in 2008. Following that we began investing in renewable heating and power at our sites and thinking about energy performance when refurbishing our buildings.
Last year, when we set ourselves our 2035 Net Zero target, we had already halved our annual emissions compared to 2008.
Our roadmap to Net Zero builds on this progress but recognises that we still don’t know the true scale of the emissions we’re responsible for. Over the next 18 months we will develop our knowledge further, including:
Our supply chain emissions;
The impact of the waste we produce;
How staff and students travel to our places.
This will let us set a new baseline to set our future progress against and help our efforts be as effective as possible.
We know that we’ll have to make more changes to our centres, investing further in low emissions heating, and in the medium term requiring tough environmental performance standards when we build or refurbish. We’re engaging our people in this journey through initiatives such as providing cash funding to innovative project ideas from grassroots staff, and employee benefits like access to a home improvements helpline focused on emissions reduction. We don’t expect to get everything perfectly right the first time, but we know we must keep up the momentum.
These operational improvements aren’t the whole story. As the OBI Environmental Charter makes clear, education is a key driver for environmental action.
At OB UK we serve over 25,000 young people a year, and we can empower and equip each of them to change the world.
Intrinsic to our residential courses is immersion in wild places. Participants feel awe and wonder through experiencing nature on scales from the immediate centre grounds to entire landscapes. Spurred by current research in education and the Environmental Charter, we are reviewing how we can deliberately make even more of these opportunities for creating connections to nature, increasing ecological understanding and enhancing the sense of environmental stewardship. We may not be able to fully measure the ripple effect of young people’s future climate positive actions inspired by their time with us, but we are doing what we can to act in the way they expect us to.
At the core of facilitating personal growth during an Outward Bound New Zealand (OBNZ) course is creating an environment where every participant feels secure enough to be authentic and open throughout their journey. This entails granting them the liberty to express their complete identity, encompassing their gender identity and sexual orientation.
At OBNZ, our mission to foster stronger communities underscores the need to prioritize the inclusion and welcome of all staff and participants, ensuring they feel valued and embraced. By enhancing inclusivity for the rainbow community, we inherently extend the benefits of our actions to other marginalized communities, amplifying the positive impact of our commitment to inclusivity across a broader spectrum.
Just as integrating women into OBNZ over 50 years ago sparked discomfort for some, actively championing our rainbow communities demands embracing non-homophobic attitudes, even when it challenges some individuals. At Outward Bound New Zealand, we've purposefully embarked on this transformative journey to enhance inclusivity for every participant and staff member alike.
Outward Bound New Zealand has committed to the New Zealand Pride Pledge which is:
We commit to all LGBTTQIA+ (rainbow) people having the freedom to be safe, included, healthy and visible and we will use our voice to actively support and celebrate rainbow communities. (www.pridepledge.co.nz)
In October 2023 all Outward Bound NZ staff attended training to learn what diversity, equity and inclusion looks like for our rainbow communities. The knowledge gained in this training inspired confidence in the staff, which led to immediate action devising and committing to actions to progress the organisation towards being more inclusive. Rainbow training has been added to all new staff inductions, to ensure the knowledge continues to grow and flow through the organisation.
The Rainbow Pride flag now flies alongside the Outward Bound NZ flag at the front of our School, staff use pronouns in their email signatures, and instructors use pronouns in their introductions to participants at the beginning of each course, providing a safe space for participants to so the same. We have changed the signage on bathrooms to be non-gendered and provided greater privacy and autonomy for students who prefer this.
During our enrolment process, participants have the opportunity to specify their gender identity. For individuals identifying as trans, gender neutral, fluid, or non-binary, we take care to discuss any gender-specific practices they may encounter during their course, such as sleeping arrangements on certain programmes. We then work together to find solutions that align with their comfort level, so they can fully engage with their Outward Bound course.
Behind the scenes, we're gathering data on participants' gender identity and affiliation with our rainbow communities. Understanding the demographics of those we serve, as well as those who are missing from our courses, is crucial for our commitment to inclusivity. We've revised our policies, eliminating heteronormative language, and are integrating gender-inclusive design into our new infrastructure.
We are excited to continue to explore ways to grow our effectiveness and better accommodate rainbow communities, and are proud to be pioneering New Zealand's inaugural rainbow leaders course.
Feedback from staff and participants about the actions taken indicates the value of proactive action.
“When I arrived at Outward Bound and I saw the rainbow pride flag, I knew I was welcome and safe at Outward Bound”
Author: MARIJA MAŽIĆ, Head of Instructor Education, OB Croatia
Young people today face numerous challenges - some arising from the technological trends of the modern era, while others represent consequences of different situations of crisis we are all exposed to. A typical day in the life of a young person is marked by rapid and competing content, constant warnings about the possible new pandemics, economic repercussions of the last one, political tensions and wars arising. Against this backdrop, it’s no wonder we’re seeing more mental health problems among youth.
The World Health Organization states that one in seven 10-19-year-olds experience mental health conditions. The consequences of this are terrible and palpable: suicide is the fourth leading cause of death among 15-29-year-olds
At the same time, young people today have more access than ever previously recorded in human history. There is less poverty, and more avenues to fulfill one’s potential. People, especially young, connect easily to one another through social media channels - and the six degrees of separation never seemed smaller. However, just having the opportunities available doesn’t mean that the problem is being resolved. Loneliness has lately been treated like an epidemic, especially impacting youth - between 5 and 15 percent of young people experience it. Although poverty seems to be going down on a global scale, inequalities are deepening by the day.
This is where we build the foundation of our programs…
framing them in a way that builds the skills of young people so that they can recognize the possibilities and act on them, while at the same time strengthening their resilience to better cope with the risks they are facing.
Our programs are therefore designed and developed in close collaboration with mental health experts, primarily psychologists and social pedagogues. Their input is used both to design specific outcomes of the particular program and for pinpointing the methodology used to achieve them. Even further, during the last couple of years, we’ve assigned significant roles to these professionals in the stage of training new and up-skilling existing instructors directly involved with program implementation.
Feedback we received in recent years marks the shift in how the participants experience our programs who identify the nuances of soft skills they upgraded during the program and afterward. We have even begun implementing booster sessions for particular programs, to ensure the sustainability of the program outcomes.
What I liked the most was realising the importance of teamwork, and what are my abilities and fears. I learned in practice the meaning of the verb 'empower'.
The phrase "now more than ever" is often used when discussing the necessity of outdoor education programs for students, especially in the post-COVID era. While I'm hesitant to claim that today's youth require outdoor education more urgently than previous generations did, it's undeniable that such programs play a crucial role in equipping young people with skills necessary for life beyond the school environment. Ultimately, the primary objective of any quality outdoor education program should be to serve our youth and empower them to thrive in all aspects of life.
Interestingly, the foundational philosophy of Outward Bound, established by Kurt Hahn, was centered on preparing youth for an uncertain future. Stemming from its origins in post-war recovery and renewal, Hahn envisioned providing transformative experiences outside the traditional classroom setting.
Similar to Hahn's observations of post-war youth, young people today grapple with issues such as anxiety, uncertainty, and social isolation. Outward Bound International has identified several key challenges unique to today's youth, including:
Rising Mental and Physical Health Challenges; exacerbated by the pandemic, highlighting the need for a strong focus on resilience.
A Global Climate and Biodiversity Crisis; underscoring the need for connection to our natural world.
Social Isolation, Fragmentation, and Polarization; stressing the importance of real-world connections and strong interpersonal skills.
Employability Challenges and Skills Gaps; emphasizing the need for practical, life-based learning programs.
Outdoor education is uniquely positioned to address these challenges, and it is imperative for organizations like Outward Bound to continue delivering adventure-based learning programs to provide young people with the tools they need to succeed in life.
In Australia, as elsewhere around the globe, the COVID-19 pandemic caused significant disruptions to daily life, with schools scrambling to adapt to lockdowns and remote learning environments.
Unfortunately, outdoor education programs were often the first casualties of these disruptions, remaining sidelined even as schools began to resume normal operations. Now, several years on from the height of the pandemic, many schools have reintegrated adventure learning programs into their curricula, recognizing their value in addressing the challenges facing today's youth.
“Outward Bound transcends individual differences and kindles within each of us a sense of community. The wilderness environment allows one’s veneers to slip away, and each person can grow through daring to risk, to care, and to share with others. As an educational forum, Outward bound offers true learning, involving heart, mind and body, in a way that will last a lifetime.”
As an educator with over 20 years of experience designing and delivering outdoor education programs, I am heartened to see schools not only reinstating outdoor adventure programs but also expanding and enhancing them to better serve our youth.
Through my own journey in this sector, I've identified several attributes of outdoor adventure programs that contribute to positive and impactful experiences for young people:
Kurt Hahn's legacy extends beyond his famous quote about “there is more in us than we know”. His insight into the transformative power of outdoor adventure learning programs resonates deeply, emphasizing the importance of community, personal growth, and our natural environment.
