Wilderness Skills Are Life Skills

Midland School’s Outdoor Programs
Offer Lessons in Tent-Pitching
and Personal Growth

By Tyler Hayden | November 16, 2023

Read all of the stories in our “Schools of Thought 2023” cover here.

If you’ve ever been backpacking, you know how much there is to learn out there. About plants and animals, of course, but also about yourself — what you’re capable of, how to push yourself a little further, how to work together as a team, and why it’s so important to take care of the land that belongs to all of us.

At Midland School — a nature-based boarding school set on 3,000 acres and 30 miles of trails just outside Los Olivos — these wilderness lessons are part of the
curriculum. Its Outdoor Leadership program, which counts as a sport credit, teaches camping skills right alongside personal development. At the end of the semester, students are assessed on their ability to read maps and tie knots as well as practice self-sufficiency and respectful group dynamics. All while following the seven Leave No Trace principles.

Building communication skills is a major component of the program, said Dan Susman, a science teacher and Midland’s dean of experiential learning. “How do we give and receive feedback with love and care? How do we let people know when they made our lives easier, and when they made it harder? That is a huge piece of what we do.”

For upperclassmen whose love of the backcountry runs especially deep, Midland also offers a Stewards program. Susman called it the “lifeblood” of the school’s outdoor offerings. Stewards embark on a series of trainings, including a 16-hour Wilderness First Aid course, and complete an apprenticeship so they can lead their classmates on night hikes and overnight trips around the property without any faculty present. “They take other students under their wing and teach them how to connect to this place,” Susman explained. “They bring the stoke.”

Trace Garcia, a junior from the Los Angeles area, is one of Midland’s star Stewards. As a way of welcoming new students to the school — introducing them to their fellow freshmen and familiarizing them with their new home — he takes them on one-night treks straight from campus into the chaparral landscape. He makes sure they have all the necessary equipment, checking out tents and sleeping bags from the communal gear shed if needed, and understands that if something goes awry, it’s up to him to figure it out. “You’re trusted with that responsibility,” he said.

Without any teachers or other adults present (but only a radio call away), the trips are “a really good way to get to know each other,” Garcia said. And they’re accessible to all, he emphasized, even to students who may have moved to Midland from a city and never worn a 30-pound pack before. “Doing challenging things together really gives you a shared sense of accomplishment,” he said.

The Steward-led one-nighters, which continue throughout the year, are also a good opportunity to clear one’s head, Garcia said. “It gets you away from the stresses of school for a little while,” he said of striking out and sleeping under the stars. “It can be really helpful for your mental health.”

Not all of Midland’s rookie backpackers will become “epic outdoors people,” Susman said. And that’s not the point. The purpose of the school’s Outdoor Leadership and Stewards programs is to “train and trust our students to teach each other” and to “care for one another and themselves,” he said.

“And if they can connect to a place and care for that place, that’s really what we’re going for,” Susman said of the reflections that come from sitting under an oak tree that started growing long before California was a state, or dipping a toe in a tributary whose route through the landscape is constantly changing. “Because that’s what the world needs,” said Susman. “For people to care about place.”