The Colorado College Outdoor Education program prides itself not only on encouraging student participation in outdoor endeavors, but also on training students for leadership roles in various wilderness settings. The numbers are incredible; in this year alone, 105 students were certified as Backcountry Level I leaders through the Ahlberg Leadership Institute (with at least 22 students on the waitlist for each training), and 163 students were hired as New Student Orientation leaders for this coming year. Clearly, there is wide interest across the student body for leading and teaching others in the outdoors. Not a single person, however, applied to be an Outdoor Recreation Committee Co-Chair for the 2016-2017 school year.
The complete and utter lack of applicants “wasn’t a complete shock to me,” admits Bennett Silverman, current co-chair. Silverman attributes the disinterest to a number of factors, including the demands of the job, pre-conceived notions, and the continually changing role and direction of the ORC.
First and foremost, being a co-chair is a time-intensive job. With his partner Melissa Seehausen, Silverman meets weekly with Outdoor Education Director Ryan Hammes and collaborates on proposing trips, selecting leaders, planning meetings, and working office hours at the Outdoor Education Center. Some meetings are small, intimate discussions with the committee itself—including the Outreach, Special, and Day Trips Coordinators, the Secretary, and the Social Chair. They also hold meetings once a block for all those on the ORC listserv, and “Milk and Cookies” meetings designed for brainstorming and planning trips. With every trip that is formally proposed, Seehausen and Silverman are also present for pre-and post-trip meetings.
Certainly there are CC students capable of satisfying these requirements—after all, Silverman and Seehausen have done the job all year. Silverman notes, however, that although many people are very involved in leadership and the ALI program, many feel intimidated by and unqualified for the position. As a co-chair, Silverman points out that it’s “hard to find [a] balance,” since the job entails being “less involved in the trips and more working behind the scenes.” Ultimately, he says, taking the job may result in “changing the role you want to have [in the ORC].”
Hammes agrees on the general hesitance towards the position. “Folks think it’s a tall order—it’s a lot of responsibility,” said Hammes. However, he does firmly believe that “the duties are certainly attainable,” despite the daunting job description. Unlike Silverman, Hammes was surprised that the job received no applicants, though some people are coming forward now with interest.
The ORC is always evolving, which adds to the difficulty one faces as co-chair. As Outdoor Ed has become more formalized, particularly through the use of Summit and the leadership trainings and certifications, Silverman feels “the community has become dispersed.” Attendence at ORC meetings is low, despite the club being the largest organized group on campus. “No one knows the old system [of the ORC],” Silverman admits, “and I don’t know what it’ll look like in a few years.” Even this year, the ORC seems different to him and operates under a new context.
Thankfully, the OE professional staff has been an immensely helpful support system throughout this shift. Not only have they put “so much work and effort into ALI,” Silverman says, they’ve also embraced working in an office after spending a good deal of time in the field doing hands-on tasks. As overseer of Outdoor Ed as a whole, Hammes is unconcerned about the lack of co-chairs for the coming year and does not foresee a significant change in how the ORC functions.
Currently, the co-chairs and their coordinators occupy the paid positions in Outdoor Ed. The co-chairs focus primarily on backpacking trips, whereas the coordinators are divided among winter sports, whitewater sports, and climbing. Instead of co-chairs for the coming year, Hammes proposes simply making backpacking trips a responsibility for the coordinators. His vision is that Outdoor Ed will continue “relying on the committee for the community piece, and the coordinators for the logistics piece” in proposing and planning trips.
The committee is, after all, a student organization, and those who have formal positions are simply volunteers. For this reason, Hammes thinks that the collaboration between the coordinators and committee members works with “the ebb and flow [of] commitment levels” among students. While the coordinators work office hours, the committee members aren’t bound to contribute a strict amount of time to their duties, thus keeping them less overwhelmed.
What’s important to Hammes is maintaining student-to-student contact. For example, if a student who is part of the ORC has an idea for an outdoor-themed party or trip, they could approach the Social Chair of the committee, who then could discuss the idea with the backpacking coordinator. Working as liaisons between club members and the professional staff, the committee members and coordinators will be able to specialize in one component of Outdoor Ed, thus more evenly dispersing responsibilities.
The future of the ORC still looks promising. Though it requires adaptation and effort to fulfill the necessary leadership roles, there are undoubtedly many students ready and able to step into these positions, whether officially or unofficially. In Hammes’ words, “The ORC is still going to function; it’s all going to happen.”