Director Jud's Blog

Have youth lost their taste for the beauty of the great outdoors? Not only are protected spaces vanishing within the world, but they are also vanishing from our schedules, and more importantly from the lives of today's teens.

A Retreat from Nature

Today’s kids are amazing – they’re creating business plans, crafting their own personal mission statements, and planning demonstrations and rallies around the topics that move them. They are purpose driven, intentional, and spend almost all of their time inside.

A wave of change has occurred as students have shifted from outdoor activities (hiking, biking, and playing tag) to indoor activities (coffee-house conversations, YouTube streaming, and video-game chatting). It’s not just the local parks that are seeing fewer and fewer kids, The United States National Parks continue to experience declining numbers of visitors year after year. While students are eating more “natural” foods, they are spending more and more time away from the natural world. I think this is not only disconcerting, but that it is hurting youth.