FORT MILEY ADVENTURE ROPES COURSE

TRUE/Fort Miley Adventure Ropes Course
San Francisco State University
Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies
1600 Holloway Ave.
San Francisco, CA 94132
(415) 338-6883
email: ssiskin@sfsu.edu

Please visit the new web pages for Fort Miley Adventure Ropes Course

Mission

Now, more than ever, our communities need people with strong communication skills; people who are trustful and trustworthy; who know how to work, play, and live together. The Fort Miley Adventure Ropes Course exists as a resource to assist all members of our community in developing these essential life skills.

The Ropes Course fosters a fun, safe, and inclusive environment in which individuals and groups may work together to develop self-confidence, group cooperation, communication, leadership and decision-making skills. Our particular commitment is to serving members of the community historically disadvantaged or disenfranchised due to their socioeconomic or ethnic background, drug or alcohol abuse, gang affiliation, teen parenthood, sexual orientation, or disability.

Goals

The first goal is to develop trust, communication, self-esteem, leadership, and team-building skills of Ropes Course participants. Ropes Course programs use physical and mental challenge to encourage collaboration, teamwork, mutual support, and personal goal-setting.

Half-day, day-long, and multi-day Ropes Course programs are designed to provide maximum adaptability to each group's special needs and specific interests. A team leader works with each group prior to their day on the course to assess their specific needs and goals.

Teachers, counselors, scout masters, and other community leaders cite a variety of reasons for choosing to use the Ropes Course as a learning and team-building tool within their programs. In particular, the Ropes Course:

builds self-confidence and a sense of personal empowerment.
encourages mutual support within a peer group.
increases a participant's awareness of agility, coordination, and physical self.
teaches participants to set goals and work toward them.
teaches participants to take appropriate risks within a safe and supportive environment.
increases a participant's ability to develop relationships based on trust and cooperation.
provides participants with an unusual opportunity to interact with each other in a natural outdoor environment.

A second goal of the Ropes Course is to develop leadership skills by providing comprehensive leadership training, and structured, supportive leadership opportunities for volunteer leaders of all ages and backgrounds. Among the reasons most commonly cited by our volunteer leaders for choosing to become involved as leaders on the Ropes Course are an interest in:

developing stronger leadership and teaching skills.
finding productive and fun ways to spend leisure time.
making valuable, positive contributions to the community.
learning more about the technical aspects of outdoor adventure programs.

Our youth leaders in particular state that the leadership opportunities available to them on the Ropes Course allow them, sometimes for the first time in their lives, to feel recognized as valuable and respected leaders within their community. They also cite the opportunity that Ropes Course leadership provides for developing positive working relationships with other youth and adults.

Current Programs

The specific programs currently run by the Fort Miley Ropes Course include:

Over one hundred day-long Ropes Course programs each year. These programs are available on a reservation only basis. Scheduling preference is given to groups comprised of disadvantaged members of the community.
GoApe Ropes Course Leadership Programs, which train over 100 youth leaders from Galileo High School each year. These youth, many of whom are at-risk of dropping out or being kicked out of school, run day long Ropes Course programs for several hundred elementary and secondary school students each year.
Ropes Course leadership trainings two times a year. The course trains approximately fifty new adult volunteers each year. Trainings are open to the public and attract people from all walks of life: ex-gang members, graduates of drug and alcohol recovery programs, high school and university students, social workers, teachers, lawyers, carpenters, police officers, engineers, and doctors among others. Last year volunteers contributed over 5000 hours of service to the Ropes Course
On-going partnership with San Francisco State University. The Ropes Course has been incorporated into the curriculum of a number of education and recreation courses.
Regularly scheduled leadership training workshops available to volunteers from all of the above programs. Training topics include group facilitation skills, communication, conflict resolution, play and adventure as effective learning tools, course maintenance, course safety, fostering diversity, basic first aid, and CPR.

The Ropes Course has been consistently successful in challenging participants to work together in new and creative ways, and to achieve personal accomplishments and interpersonal connections they add not previously believed possible. The Ropes Course curently maintains a waiting list of teachers, counselors, scout masters, and community organizers - all of whom are eager to add a day on the course to their program curriculum. The Ropes Course is also receiving an increasing number of requests from high school teachers, counselors and recreation center directors who are interested in having their students trained as Ropes Course Leaders.

Volunteers

Thank you for your interest in becoming a volunteer. Volunteer Ropes Course leaders are a dedicaated, enthusiastic, fun-loving group of people. I am pleased that you are considering joining us.

We will be offering trainings in the spring and summer. To qualify for the training, you must be able to participate in the entire training.

Cost of the training is $100. Fees include Ft. Miley Leader Guide, t-shirt and snacks.

Call: (415) 338-6883 for an application. Applications are reviewed on a first come, first served basis. Acceptance letters will be mailed two weeks prior to each training. Return to Bay Area Volunteer Information Center home page