Diversity

Diversity, Essays, Expedition Denali, Magazines, Public Land, Uncategorized / 06.08.2018

Over my coffee on a Saturday morning I reached for a new magazine at the top of my reading pile. I actually thought it was the Patagonia catalog, thrilled to see at first glance a person of color on the cover. On closer inspection, though, I realized that it was the American Alpine Club “Guidebook to Membership”. A tight close-up image of a face with apparently dark skin wearing glasses had that vaguely artistic quality that offers little in the way of relevant information but draws the viewer in...

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#BlackLivesMatter, #ORSummer, Diversity, Outdoor Retailer, Outside Magazine / 31.07.2018

  On Day Zero of the 2018 Outdoor Retailer Summer Market I strolled around the Colorado Convention Center. As exhibitors set up their booths in advance of the four-day trade show I began plotting a course of travel to traverse a path from one end the sprawling structure to the other. As I made my way to the front of the building I was excited to see a crew of familiar faces. My friend Rue Mapp had just arrived with a few leaders of her empowerment group known as...

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Commentary, Diversity, Outdoor Retailer / 11.07.2018

More than 25 years ago I attended the Outdoor Retailer Show for the first time. It was in January of 1992 and I believe that it was in Reno, Nevada. I was 26 years old, just three years out of college, but I had spent much of that time working at the REI store in Berkeley. At the beginning of my career in the outdoor industry I made the rounds doing a variety of jobs ranging from retail to guiding. I even worked teaching classes in wilderness first-aid...

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Diversity, Nelson Institute, Outdoors For All / 31.05.2018

  My class Outdoors For All at the University of Wisconsin Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies is a 12-day course presented over 4 weeks. I'm presenting each day as a series of chapters like a book.  In Chapter 5 my students are learning about the Green Book. Written by a U.S. Postal Service employee named Victor Hugo Green, this travel guide for African-American motorists was an essential tool for the ability of Black people to safely navigate the highways, small towns and big cities of the United States from...

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Diversity, Nelson Institute, Outdoors For All / 24.05.2018

Over the past several months I've been preparing materials to teach a college course on the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion in outdoor recreation and environmental conservation. Despite having spent the last decade of my life working to unravel the mysteries behind the desparities of those who spend time in nature and those who don't, I still struggle to understand what we can do to correct them. Having literally written a book on the topic I suppose it was inevitable that would be asked to more thoroughly...

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Diversity, Outside Magazine / 09.04.2018

When Outside Magazine editor Michael Roberts contacted me in the late Fall of 2017 I was thrilled beyond words. At the time I was on the road working my annual gig for the nonprofit Choose Outdoors reporting on the journey of the U.S. Capitol Christmas Tree. Michael called me out of the blue while I was shopping at a Walgreens in Helena Montana. As I roamed the aisles looking for alcohol wipes, Altoids and AA-batteries he asked me to write the cover story for the May issue.  Let’s just...

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