Note: Scholarship recipients are asked to provide a follow-up note concerning the experience. Individuals' names, program names and all locations references have been deleted. No other editing/deletions have been made.
My daughter recently completed an 8-week therapeutic wilderness program with the assistance of your foundation. She did not enter this program by choice but had been acting out in increasingly dangerous ways at home (running away and using drugs and alcohol).. I am a single parent and had to borrow a large amount of money to send her to this program. The money provided by your foundation made it possible for her to stay a week longer than I had been able to pay for……….…………..As a part of this program girls live in the wilderness, backpacking and canoeing and working with therapists and counselors to get to the underlying causes of harmful behaviors. It seemed to me that getting her away from her negative peer group for a while and having her in a setting where she would not be distracted by peer drama, drugs and alcohol, cell phone, IM and MySpace, would give her the opportunity to figure out what was behind her behavior. We chose to do this in a beautiful outdoor setting where she was challenged both physically and emotionally. She had to work with a group of girls to be self-sufficient in all their daily living chores. After being in the program about 4 weeks, she said to her therapist, “I feel alive again”. This reinforced my belief in the powerful impact wilderness programs can have. She regained a sense of self and felt a great deal of personal accomplishment from her experience. She especially talks about the experience of white water canoeing in some particularly challenging rapids as having been a fun challenge. This program brought out her leadership skills and helped her get more honest about the problems she is facing.My daughter is now home. While she has not completely turned a corner on some of her past problems, she is attending school daily, doing her school work, following rules at home and participating in some positive activities after school. Had she not participated in the wilderness program, I think we/she would not be in as positive place today. Thank you so much for your support.
