Long hikes, solo camping, repelling cliffs: Aspen School District’s outdoor education program starts new year with high recognition
Katherine Gleason/Courtesy photo
Good luck getting a hold of Aspen School District Outdoor Education Coordinator Katherine Gleason this week. Requests will likely be met by this automatic email reply, “I will be in the back country with students until the 12th. I will respond upon my return!”
Each year, Gleason brings local eighth-grade students on a days-long excursion traversing places like the Lead King Basin Loop, a challenging, 12.4 mile-route flanked by over 14,000-foot peaks via Maroon Bells. There, they learn camp crafts, back-country navigation, orienteering and, simply put, problem solving.
“They learn something I like to call ‘old-school navigation,’ because they’re using an actual paper map and a compass to kind of figure out where they’re going, how far they have to go, the elevations,” Gleason said.
This experience, part of the district’s outdoor education program, has been offered to Aspen students since 1967. Pupils kindergarten through senior year are taken on overnight trips in the White River National Forest. For Aspen High School, it’s called “Experimental Educational week.”
But this season is a little different. After 57 years of offering outdoor education, this marks the first year of the district being the only public educational institution in the country to get accredited by the Association of Experiential Education.
“This is not just a camping trip with your family,” Gleason said. “This is something that a lot of people in the world work really hard to support and make sure it can happen, and we are doing that to those standards. It also gives us a lot of opportunities for professional development.”
Arguably, this outdoor educational experience is as quintessentially Colorado as any district can get. Gleason took it even further, calling it more of an “Aspen thing.”
Why?
There’s a parcel near Ruedi Reservoir donated by the late Fritz Benedict, a cherished local who, among his many contributions to Aspen, served in the 10th Mountain Division during World War II and created the 10th Mountain Hut and Trail system running from Aspen to Vail. Aspen High Schoolers, at 11,370 feet above sea level, use this land for outdoor courses, and they also perform maintenance on a cabin built by eighth graders in the 1990s.
Then there are outdoor program instructors and volunteers, many Colorado natives with unbreakable penchants for hiking, camping, biking and ripping winter slopes.
Gleason, raised in the Denver suburbs, grew up backpacking and later acquired a masters degree in outdoor experiential education from Plymouth State University. One of her volunteer instructors, Pat Callahan, graduated Aspen High School class of 1983. A former Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard coach for 31 years, he spends his retired days doing 5,000-mile bikes across Africa when he’s not taking Aspen eighth graders on fall backpacking trips.
And when one of the 117 enrolled students needs equipment — say, backpacks, sleeping bags, proper clothing — funds gathered from the annual Aspen Ski Swap are used to purchase supplies.
And just like that, after the Association of Experiential Education made site visits to the valley, the Aspen School District met 150 minimum standards to receive its accreditation.
“I think the biggest thing is that it ensures consistency,” Gleason said of the accreditation. “One of the hardest parts was when people would retire, we would lose all that knowledge. And so now we have my position, as well as a manual and some systems that won’t disappear just because somebody leaves their job, whether they retire or move on, or whatever.”
THE HIGH REPEL
Callahan took his eighth graders this week to the Snowmass Lake hike. With an elevation gain from 8,394 to 10,983 feet, it’s a strenuous, 16.6-mile loop through the Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness Area.
Within this alpine loop is called “the high repel.” Students start at a 140-foot cliff beside Lizard Lake. Bob Wade, owner of Aspen mountaineer shop Ute Mountaineer, harnesses students in as they bounce their way down to solid ground.
One year, Callahan remembered a girl who refused to repel down.
“We finally talked her into it,” he said. “To watch her light up after that was the coolest thing.”
Callahan, who did his eighth-grade fall trip in 1978, said the excursion pushes people to do things they don’t think they can do, only for them to overcome their reservations and complete the tasks at hand.
“The hike over, there’s kids who think there’s no way they can hike for four days and make it there, and they’ll all do it,” he said.
According to Callahan, the district’s newest accreditation is an opportunity to build upon the legacy of former Aspen outdoor education instructors.
“Think of how many people who’ve given to this to get to that point. It really is remarkable,” he said. “It’s a step above what any other school can do.”
Callahan simply calls it “such a cool experience,” and for the students to live through his eyes is a great opportunity for him, so he was happy to give back after retiring from the Ski and Snowboard Club.
“In my class, there’s so many people who are mountain climbers and runners, and people who’ve done amazing things in the outdoors,” he said. “I think a big part of it is because they come up through the outdoor education program and realize that.”
THE SOLO
Jesse Kravitz remembers it distinctly.
The 14-year-old Aspen High School freshman was on the West Maroon Pass Loop last year, where he backpacked for three consecutive nights. One of those nights was what everyone refers to as “the solo.”
“They left us on our own with nothing but water, our sleeping bags, and a tarp and clothes,” he said. “Then we got to base camp, where all the other groups from different routes convened, and we did group-bonding challenges there.”
Students don’t really have food during solos, according to Kravitz.
“I really didn’t eat anything. I heard some people ate wild berries,” he said, adding, “I ended up sleeping a lot of my solo, but I think when I got out of it, there was a girl on my trip’s birthday, and we had this Oreo cake, and I ate so much of it that I threw up.”
Kravitz’s outdoor middle-school experiences have only translated to him yearning for more. For Aspen High School’s Experiential Education Program, students have a bidding system to see what trips they want to take. With about 15-20 trips to choose from, Kravitz elected to go on a car-camping trip at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.
Kravitz, who Nordic skis for Aspen Ski and Snowboard Club and also mountain bikes, said he really likes being outdoors, and that the experiences — whether with his family or the school district — will “stay with me forever.”
More importantly, Kravitz said the solitude his outdoor excursions taught him not to take everything for granted.
“I think I learned that it’s really important that I’m with my thoughts every once in a while,” he said. “Because I really like being with people and talking to people, but I think it’s important that you’re with your own thoughts at least a little bit every day, just so you have time to reflect on yourself.”
Ray K. Erku can be reached at (970) 429-9120 or rerku@aspentimes.com.
