How Your Gift Helps
Connecting people to the natural landscape is important because people will care to protect what they know and value. In 2010, The Mountaineers made a commitment to invest resources in the development of programs built on the organization's core strengths of outdoor education, conservation and volunteerism. Now celebrating our 10-year anniversary as a 501(c)(3) organization, all gifts made to The Mountaineers (Tax ID 27-3009280) are 100% tax-deductible. With the generous support of members and donors, and a rigorous commitment to fiscal responsibility, you make it possible for The Mountaineers to experience remarkable growth in programs targeted at getting young people outside and providing stewardship for our public lands.
Your gift today teaches courage to young people. It inspires thousands of people with stories of
legends and adventure. It supports leaders and educators who, in turn, make us better outdoor advocates.
youth program diversification and expansion
Outdoor adventure offers young people the chance to explore new places and discover new things about themselves. Out experience, gleaned over generations, is that the best connections between kids and the outdoors happen over the space of months, even years. A single field trip can pique a child's interest, but a full and transformative experience of the outdoors happens in the context of a child's community, peers, and support networks.
The Mountaineers recognizes that outdoor education is social learning, and connecting young people with the outdoors is critical not only to their health, but also to the health of our natural landscapes. Youth need the benefit of a healthy, active outdoor lifestyle, and our landscapes need the protection of individuals with a strong connection to the outdoors.
That's why The Mountaineers is committed to long-term partnerships with schools and youth organizations through our Mountain Workshops program. Working closely with agencies like local YMCAs, Title I public schools, shelters, and more, we design curriculum tailored to the age, background, and needs of each group. We meet each group of kids where they're at, working on basic skills and introductory experience. Together, we build up to adventures they might never have dreamed of having.
Access across all of our programs, The Mountaineers introduces thousands of youth to the outdoors each year. These young people become leaders in their classroom and in their communities. They become volunteers and instructors for younger students. And, when they become adults, they'll carry a piece of wilderness in their hearts.
Adventurers of all ages and ability levels come to The Mountaineers looking to explore, conserve, learn about, and enjoy the natural world. As Mountaineers, we believe that everyone has the right to experience the outdoors. However, the reality is that many people in our communities face significant barriers to experiencing our wild places, including limited access to appropriate gear and clothing.
To help address this barrier, The Mountaineers partnered with local nonprofits, corporate sponsors, and individual donors to launch a Gear Library in 2018. Outfitted with tents, sleeping bags, hiking boots, clothing, snowshoes, and more, the library provides free access to most of the gear a budding adventurer needs to safely recreate outdoors.
To keep up this great work we need your help! Programs like the Gear Library and Mountain Workshops allow us to significantly increase our community impact and ensure that all people can experience the outdoors. With expanded philanthropic support, we will continue to grow these programs by increasing our community partnerships and further diversifying the types of gear available for loan in our Gear Library for youth and adults alike.
Conservation: Creating a Community of Outdoor Citizens
Through our Conservation Advocacy and Stewardship Programs we inspire member engagement to protect public lands and the outdoor experiences they provide and The Mountaineers is committed to building a bridge between love of place and taking action to protect it.
In 2020, we offered 133 stewardship activities and awarded 349 Low Impact Recreation badges. We also celebrated the passing of the Great American Outdoors Act - perhaps the win of the century for our outdoor places. Among many things, this legislation will permanently and fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund and provide billions of dollars to restore and maintain parks and public lands. Additionally, the Wild Olympics and SOAR Acts have advanced in congress despite the odds. Our members played a key part in these successes by contributing 4,666 letters and signatures to our legislators.
With over 41,000 people tuned into our conservation communications, it’s imperative that we educate our community about key public lands issues, so they are empowered to protect wild landscapes and the places we play. Read the perspective of Adam Cramer, Executive Director of Outdoor Alliance, on the importance of The Mountaineers voice.
Volunteers: Engaging the Community and Getting People Outside
Our programs are taught by highly trained volunteer leaders who possess years of outdoor experience, a passion for the outdoors, and an enthusiasm for teaching outdoor skills. We are dedicated to cultivating a tradition of volunteer-led education.
To support the personal growth of our volunteers and volunteer leaders, and continue to build on the momentum of the Progressive Climbing Education initiative, the Alpine Ambassadors program was launched in 2018. Made possible through donor and volunteer support, this innovative leadership program offers world-class training for our advanced climbing instructors. Through charitable contributions and corporate sponsorships, we are able to strategically invest in training, recognition, course innovation, and teaching and gathering places for our volunteers. These investments elevate our ability to deliver exceptional outdoor experiences, and ensure that we can keep volunteers feeling supported and challenged to best serve our growing community.
In 2020, a year where outdoor recreation was one of the only group activities available, Mountaineers volunteers have provided countless opportunities to create connection between people and place. Thousands of participants attended our varied virtual programming from all over the world. Even our youth programs got involved, offering hybrid summer camps and virtual clubs programming. Thanks to the creativity of our dedicated community of volunteers we more than quadrupled the impact of our hybrid and virtual programming, keeping our community together through tough times.
During this difficult year volunteers stepped up to rebalance budgets, supported one another to recreate responsibly, and learned new tools to connect with their communities. With new safety precautions in place, 427 volunteer trip leaders led 2,126 participants on 1,495 trips. Thank you to the 2,784 members who volunteered their time in 2020, and to the many others who supported from afar. The Mountaineers is successfully weathering the COVID storm because of your leadership.
Books: Leading Readers to the Great Outdoors
Mountaineers Books, along with its Skipstone and Braided River imprints, publishes award-winning recreation, sustainable lifestyle and conservation advocacy books.
Today, Mountaineers Books has more than 700 titles in print. They empower our global outdoor community by leading readers into the outdoors safely, and providing information and access to newcomers, families, and people of all ages. Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills, now in a new 9th Edition, remains our flagship guide—a tribute to the organization’s gold standard instruction and the volunteers who keep the text up-to-date. This past year has been filled with challenges, but it hasn't been without its silver linings. During 2020 thirteen of our titles were recognized by various book award competitions, and we couldn't be more proud.
Teaching and GATHERING PLACES FOR LEARNING AND COMMUNITY
Located in Magnuson Park in Seattle and a few blocks away from Commencement Bay in Tacoma, The Mountaineers Program Centers are unique urban-based facilities designed to support the instruction of hundreds of outdoor recreation courses and activities. The facilities have become widely recognized as major hubs and gathering places for the greater outdoor recreation and conservation communities hosting major film festivals, conservation forums, and nationally recognized speakers.
Since before the Seattle Program Center opened in 2008, Mountaineers leaders and volunteers
envisioned the construction of a world-class, comprehensive facility fully equipped to support
the instruction and practice of essential skills for the beginning to advanced alpine climber. The effort has attracted broad support over the years because it’s an in-city, safer, cost-effective, and environmentally-friendly alternative to fragile alpine peaks, meadows, and crowded crags. Generous donor and volunteer support since then has enabled The Mountaineers to install real basalt columns to teach advanced climbing techniques, and furnish the program center with indoor and outdoor climbing walls, and a boulder to support adult beginner courses and youth programs, like Mountain Workshops and summer day camps. In January 2018, donors and volunteers celebrated the completion of The Friction Slabs at the Seattle Program Center, a one-of-a-kind teaching structure built to improve our educational experiences. Local facilities like these provide state-of-the-art training for our students and decrease our impact on the environment. Looking ahead, our goal is to continue to expand accessible teaching and gathering places to further increase our ability to serve our communities.
Bequests have provided transformational impact for Mountaineers Teaching and Gathering Places. A major bequest from a Tacoma Mountaineer initiated the renovation of the Tacoma Program Center in 2011. Another legacy gift made it possible for The Mountaineers to initiate important restoration projects for the Kitsap Cabin and grounds where the Kitsap Forest Theater is located. Additional donor contributions enabled the expansion and completion of the program center and the construction of an indoor climbing wall in time for the Tacoma branch's 100-year anniversary in 2012. The facility renovation has enhanced outdoor recreation instruction and enabled the expansion of The Mountaineers successful youth programs model into the South Sound region.