In May 2014, I received a private message via Facebook. It was the summer after Expedition Denali, and I was in the final stages of writing the book that would become The Adventure Gap: Changing the Face of the Outdoors. Stories of the first African-American climbing team to attempt a summit of the highest peak in North America had been widely reported in the news. Many of the climbers, upon their safe return home, had begun a national speaking tour in the hopes of inspiring people—in particular, young people of color—across the country to pursue their interests in outdoor recreation and environmental conser-vation. Having helped to expand the discussion of diversity in the natural world by writing several magazine and news-paper articles, I had earned a bit of notoriety on this issue. And every once in a while someone would reach out for a word of advice.
“I work at an expeditionary learning school in St. Paul, MN,” Ed Lysne wrote to me. “We try to do a lot of outdoor stuff with our youth. Unfortunately, they don't always 'buy into it. . . .' However, we have started a special outdoor program for 12 teen African-American males, which I am overseeing. (I am white, FYI.) On one recent outing, one of our boys said, ‘Black people just aren't MADE for the outdoors!’ How would you respond to that? I told him I knew of some African American Moun-taineers. Would you be willing to visit our school?”
Like most people, even I have a hard time believing that one’s race or ethnicity would preclude them from participating in outdoor activities. Having enjoyed both a lifelong passion and professional career as a person who loves the outdoors, I still find it difficult to fathom how anyone would presume that just because they are a person of color, they inherently “aren’t made for the outdoors.” But, through the course of my adventuring and at points of engagement with the general public, I have come to realize a sad and disappointing fact. There is indeed a deep divide between those who spend time in nature and those who do not that, tragically, falls sharply along racial lines. The adventure gap that I describe in my book is a real phenomenon that will only continue to grow larger if we choose to ignore it.
Over the past several months, I have been invited to share the story of Expedition Denali at middle schools, high schools, universities, and gatherings of pro-fessional outdoor educators and their students. Presenting my book as well as the film I co-produced, called "An American Ascent," I’ve welcomed the questions and comments of young people who share my interest in creating a conservation movement that matches the diversity of their campuses and the U.S. population as a whole. As a writer and storyteller, I can help to put into historical context the narrative of minority participation in outdoor activities, but it is the respon-sibility of today’s youth to make modern environmental activism socially and culturally relevant to the interests of their fellow students and peers.
At Dartmouth College, I found that students are actively seeking out ways to welcome and engage their minority classmates into campus organizations where they are typically under- underrepresented. Michaela Caplan, vice president of the Dartmouth Outing Club (DOC), wrote in an op-ed that she hopes to create a sub-organization that addresses the interests of people of color, similar to a group started in the 1990s to serve the needs of female students called Women in the Wilderness (or WIW).
“A serious discussion about starting a mentorship program for all new members of the DOC has begun, so that no one will enter a meeting without a familiar presence there to greet them,” Caplan wrote in her campus newspaper, The Dartmouth. “The current thinking about the new member club is that, like WIW, it would also lead trips available to all Dartmouth students, but the leaders in this DOC will be [people of color] and/or international students. At least five minority students who have extensive wilderness experience (mostly outside of the DOC) have expressed interest in and excitement about becoming leaders.”
Caplan and other student organizers across the country recognize the importance of creating a cultural environment where all of those interested in participating are made to feel welcome. The customs and traditions of past racial segregation endure into the present day to create unconscious barriers that suggest to people of color that they should opt out of activities they have every right to enjoy.
Sadly, the face of outdoor recreation has become institutionalized to reflect almost exclusively the values and priorities of the mainstream population, which Caplan describes as white, heterosexual, and upper middle class. With few role models or visible examples of fellow community members successfully spending time in nature, compounded by the impression that they don’t belong, many of her minority classmates will seek other forms of recreation. And although she too is reluctant to assign any blame for these circumstances of culture, she insists that now that we are aware they exist, we must do what we can to make things right.