From a Ryan Brady Photo
Program Description (continued)                   
Mission and Philosophy     Risk Management     Ethics          
                          

The Outdoor Education Program prepares students for the profession of teaching in, about, and for the outdoor environment.  Students are educated in leadership and accessibility concerns, risk management and emergency care skills, program design, education and wilderness philosophies, teaching techniques, group process and communication, and wilderness skills.  Outdoor education majors are empowered to establish and maintain a relationship with nature.  The program also advocates personal growth, community and environmental justice, and stewardship for the land, water, and living systems on Earth. Finally, the program integrates Outdoor Education studies with the environmental liberal arts.  Outdoor Education graduates work in state and national parks, nature centers, zoos, wilderness adventure businesses, and therapeutic outdoor programs.

The Outdoor Education faculty is committed to promoting academic excellence, interdisciplinary studies, and the pedagogies of environmental education, outdoor and adventure education, social justice studies, therapeutics, and service learning.

Unique to the Outdoor Education Program at Northland College, students majoring in Natural History can also obtain a Wisconsin teacher licensure in environmental studies-secondary education.  While students majoring in Therapeutic and Universal Design can also obtain a Wisconsin teacher licensure in alternative education-secondary education.

Also unique to Northland College, the Outdoor Education Program offers two significant groupings of courses: Fall Outdoor Educator Professional Development Block and Winter Outdoor Educator Professional Development Block.  During their junior or senior years, outdoor education majors are required to participate in one of the Professional Development Blocks. 

The Professional Development Blocks are distinctively designed, and integrated courses within the Outdoor Education Program that focus on the transformation of college juniors majoring in outdoor education into professionally prepared teachers of outdoor education.  Students in the professional development blocks focus on concepts and skills of becoming teachers in, about, and for the outdoor environment.  In addition to being taught by professional outdoor educators from Northland College or the Audubon Center of the North Woods, students also spend concentrated time within another professional education setting under the tutelage of well qualified professional mentors.  These experiences are two- to three-week mini-internships in settings such as environmental learning centers, outdoor education centers, and alternative education programs and outdoor adventure programs.  The Northland College Outdoor Education Program has more than 25 years of experience in integrated semester blocks.

Students successfully completing either the Outdoor Educator Professional Development Block have demonstrated the abilities to:

·        determine the goals and/or needs of a specific client group;

·        design educational experiences based on specified goals;

·        design and implement effective lesson and program plans;

·        develop basic assessment tools for determining program effectiveness;

·        identify and manage risks associated with program delivery;

·        work cooperatively with intra- and inter-agency personnel;

·        teach individually and cooperatively;

·        teach holistically using the foundation of various educational theories;

·        teach concepts and skills within varied outdoor and indoor environments; and

·        additionally, depending on which Profession Development Block taken, students will gain specific abilities in one of these additional
     areas:  natural history interpretation or teaching outdoor education concepts and skills to people with diverse cognitive, physical, or
     social abilities.

The outdoor education minor is designed to help students add a meaningful outdoor experiential education component to any related major.  This minor helps prepare students to face the great challenge our time. While many of us learn through a challenge of choice, this minor helps prepare students to face the far greater challenge of our time, that being to live well with our fellow citizens and with Planet Earth.  The minor classes help students address ecological and social challenges while preparing them to be change agents for their communities, Planet Earth, and themselves.

BLOCK COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

Fall Outdoor Education Professional Development Block is a combination of the following three courses.

OED 381 Outdoor Education Teaching Techniques

OED 382  Outdoor Education Practicum

OED/BIO 383 Ecological Ecosystem Interpretation in Natural Science

The Fall Professional Development Block is a resident program at the Audubon Center of the North Woods that explores both geology and biology interpretation and their interrelationships.  It provides opportunities for students to teach in a variety of settings while developing their own personal knowledge of the environment.  This semester includes interpretive field trips to various Minnesota sites and teaching experiences with school aged children through college students.  The semester also includes teaching in a student-designed outdoor education leadership program at the Audubon Center of the North Woods.  Prerequisite:  Junior standing or instructor consent, GSC 120 and OED 361 or EDU 305.  Recommended preparation:  OED 261 and OED 289.  Fee required.

Winter Outdoor Education Professional Development Block is a  combination of the following four courses:

OED 378 Adventure Programming and Leadership

OED 379 Therapeutic Design

OED 381 Outdoor Education Teaching Techniques

OED 382 Outdoor Education Practicum

The Winter Professional Development Block is based on the main campus and is designed as an immersion into lesson development, program design and implementation required in adventure and therapeutic environments. Students teach a variety of populations while developing their own strategies in group management and lesson delivery.

Hallmarks of the semester are the development and delivery of a multi-day leadership development program for at-risk young adults through the Blackwell Civilian Conservation Job Corps Center, working as adjunct volunteer instructors for the Breckenridge Outdoor Education Center, and completion of a three-week mini practicum in an individully chosen area of professional interest. Prerequisites:  OED 279; and PED 045 or alpine skiing proficiency; and one of OED 221, PSY 303, PSY 315 or PGS/ENV 215.  Fee required.

Directed Electives in Business for Outdoor Educators

Students majoring in Outdoor Education desiring to start and operate their own business should take the following courses in addition to their outdoor education requirements. 

BUS 222     Principles of Financial Accounting       4
BUS 228     Marketing       3
BUS 229     Small Business Management       3
BUS 329     Management       3