2024 Conference Workshops

We all want our students and participants to leave our programs confident and empowered by their new knowledge, and how we kick off our day, week, year, or hour together can shape their entire experience. The first few activities of a program are crucial to creating an environment where participants feel their identities and experiences will be honored and respected.

Participants will leave this workshop with new activities, both interactive and passive, to help them create an emotionally safe and empowering space for their participants. We will particularly focus on teaching Choose Your Challenge and on small gestures and practices to show participants that their identities and experiences are welcome in that space.

Maggie Riederer (she/they) has over a decade of experience facilitating challenge courses, training facilitators, and working with youth in classroom settings, including multiple years spent in Special Education. She is currently the challenge course supervisor at Camp Long with Seattle Parks and Recreation.

Tino Martinez (he/him) is an experienced challenge course facilitator, wilderness trip leader, trainer, and course manager. He is focused on making outdoor spaces more inclusive and welcoming to people of color and others who have been historically excluded from such experiences. He is currently the challenge course manager at Northwest Teambuilding and Level 2 trainer for Signature Research.

This course provides a focused guide to the essential role of documentation in the challenge course industry, emphasizing simplicity and compliance with ACCT standards. Participants will learn how thorough yet straightforward documentation ensures safety, regulatory compliance, and operational efficiency. The session covers key aspects of equipment and apparatus inspections, including daily, monthly, and annual checklists, maintenance logs, and equipment tracking systems, with references to other relevant documents. Additionally, the course explores programmatic reporting, focusing on the importance of documenting near-misses, accidents, and incidents, and outlines follow-up procedures for post-incident evaluations. Throughout, the course emphasizes consistency, clarity, and accountability in documentation, while maintaining a simple and effective approach. Participants will also gain insights into storage and retention best practices, with references to additional necessary forms of documentation. The session concludes with a Q&A to address specific questions and challenges.

Jonathan Lumb is the West Coast Regional Director for Experiential Systems Inc., with over 14 years of experience in the challenge course industry. Holding a degree in Industrial Design, he specializes in the design, construction, inspection, and training of commercial operations such as zip line tours, aerial adventure parks, and climbing walls.

Kelton Fick is a Field Technician for Experiential Systems Inc., with 9 years of experience in the challenge course and summer camp industries. Holding a degree in Outdoor Adventure Leadership, he specializes in the training, maintenance, administration, and facilitation of commercial operations such as zip line tours, adventure parks, and climbing walls.

Have you looked at your organization's code of conduct lately? It's probably garbage. We work to engage our adventure activity participants in creating a group culture that is respectful and psychologically safe, yet often our organizations don't live up to this same standard. What if you systemically altered how your organization treats staff and functions when conflict arises to create a culture based on trust, respect, and justice? If you are challenged by interpersonal conflict in your organization, or retaining excellent staff, or aligning your organizational values with your organizational procedures, come to this session. We'll cover some of the toxic assumptions embedded in your code of conduct and a process for creating something new and better that supports staff to be accountable for high standards and community-oriented when working together.

Iggy Perillo (she/her) is a looooooong time educator in high challenge, high reward environments. She's worked for Outward Bound for over 25 years leading canoe, backpacking and dogsled/ski expeditions and she holds a masters degree in Experiential Education. Iggy founded WSL Leadership to work with thoughtful leaders who are creating cultures based on trust, respect, and justice.

What the heck is TEAMBUILDING anyway? So often people talk about teams and teambuilding, but don't actually teach facilitators how to approach these concepts. Come hear some models of teambuilding that have changed how I think and plan a day on the challenge course.

Amy Watson (she/her) has been facilitating for 20 years in various capacities--Christian Camp counselor, Synergo facilitator, adjunct professor, youth pastor, etc. She is currently the Program Director for Synergo and has the opportunity to work with many amazing groups of a variety of backgrounds.

Whether you are a facilitator, guide, or supervisor, the state of your nervous system has a profound influence on the emotions and experience of those looking to you for guidance. When we lead others from a regulated state, we can better navigate the inevitable challenges of working with humans while providing a balanced presence that invites others into states of balance through the phenomenon of co-regulation. Without regulation, it is difficult (if not impossible) to access tools and strategies we have learned because we are operating from lower and more reactive parts of our brains. Going beyond surface-level "self-care" conversations, we will explore, discuss, and practice strategies for increasing self-awareness and state regulation, both in acute states of dysregulation and practices for building long-term resilience.

Jo Linden (she/her) has been facilitating experiential social-emotional learning in classrooms, on challenge courses, and in other settings with youth and adults for over a decade. She now works to support facilitators and other youth-serving professionals to use experiential and relationship-based strategies to foster resilience and cultivate mental and emotional health through her training and consulting business, Linden Connects.