A Happy Anniversary for the National Outdoor Leadership School

By Scott Poniewaz, 6-08-05

	Caption: The clouds break for a NOLS student and instructor in the Talkeetna Mountains, Alaska. Photo by Scott Poniewaz/New West.

On June 8, 1965, forty-three students set out into the Wind River Range with a “whoop and holler” with Paul Petzoldt and five other guides to learn wilderness travel and leadership skills. Little did they know they were the pioneers of what would become the world’s foremost wilderness leadership school. The Lander, Wyo. based National Outdoor Leadership School has trained some 75,000 people around the world from 11 base locations on five continents over the past 40 years, and it's taking just a little time this week to celebrate its successes.

I exchanged the Liberal Arts building at the University of Montana for a semester’s worth of college credit in the vast wilderness of Alaska with NOLS in the summer of 2003. I can attest, as almost all of my fellow alumni would, that the experience I gained from those 75-days has been used just about everyday since. On the couple of occasions I have set out to travel to distant countries, my father uses that fact to reassure my mother of my safety, “NOLS trains students to survive anywhere in the world Sharon.”

	NOLS students move camps while mountaineering in the Chugach Mountains, Alaska. Photo by Scott Poniewaz/New West

Though I went into my course with quite a bit of experience, I graduated knowing that I could survive in wilderness no matter the conditions (which included being stormed in for a few days awaiting a re-ration of food on on the Nelchina Glacier and having to rely on uncooked pancake batter for calories by the end).

I would trade almost anything to be back among the glaciers and towering peaks of Alaska to celebrate the 40th anniversary of NOLS today. Rich Brame, the Alumni Relations Manager at NOLS, said there would be a few informal parties this week to celebrate the anniversary, as well as a big bash in Lander on October 7 and 8.

 

NOLS founder Paul Petzoldt had an extensive resume of outdoor leadership, including being one of the first guides with Exum Mountain Guides, which began leading people up the Tetons in the 1920’s. Petzoldt first bagged the Grand Teton in cowboy boots in 1924, at the age of 16, though not too many people believed him at the bar that night. He later helped develop the Colorado-based Outward Bound, but realized the need for better leadership training. With that thought the National Outdoor Leadership School was launched in March of 1965.

NOLS focuses a lot on technical wilderness skills, everything from climbing to caving. However, according to Brame, the two things NOLS has been most successful with are their Leave No Trace program and leadership education.

	Marisa Bollman ponders a move, while Carolyn Button looks on in a makeshift game of checkers. The group was waiting out a storm in the Talkeetna Mountains. Photo by Scott Poniewaz/New West

“The Leave No Trace program has taught people to love the land more than the way they love to do things,” he said. He gave an example of how the program has evolved over the years: burying metal cans was thought to be sound low-impact wilderness travel, but that method is now viewed as outdated and NOLS now practices and teaches "pack it in, pack it out." NOLS’ theory of leadership, Brame said, is that “good leaders make good decisions,” “its a thinking person’s game when you’re out there.” The curriculum for leadership training is so strong that NOLS landed several NASA astronauts in the Wind River Range this past March to teach them the expedition and leadership skills needed for extended space missions.

The programs continue to grow with people from their teens to adults, but as NOLS turns forty with a “whoop and a holler,” I asked Brame what the next forty years looked like for the school. “I think what we’re teaching will still remain true, afterall, they aren’t making anymore wilderness.”

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