Yesterday the ARC students in Yosemite rafted down the Merced River with Half Dome and El Capitan in the background. There were splash wars, smiles, and a lot of laughter. The students also stopped along the way to test the water quality of the Merced. They conducted tests for PH level, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, nitrates, […]
Maria Sanchez Becomes a Leader Among her Peers
Maria Sanchez began the ARC Summer Course in Tahoe with little confidence in her ability to complete what she started. Yet, as one of the most engaged and enthusiastic ARC alumni over the past two years, she has proven that pushing through is a benefit to herself and an example to others. Joining ARC after […]
“Yosemite is the coolest place I’ve ever been!”
“This is honestly the coolest place I’ve been to (along with my hometown in Mexico),” wrote Maria Hernandez, a sophomore at Dos Palos High School, as she sat sitting in front of a campfire in Yosemite. Maria along with her fellow ARC participants had visited Chilnualna Falls earlier in the day and had just finished […]
Turning Life Around with ARC
When you’re a high school sophomore who has never experienced life away from home, forty days feels like a long time to be separated from your family. Francisco del Rio, a 2013 Adventure Risk Challenge summer course participant, described the feeling of leaving home like “the Pacific Ocean was ready to release its massive waves […]
Adventure Risk Challenge: Becoming Yourself
When Karla Hernandez participated in ARC’s 24-day Summer Immersion Course in Lake Tahoe in 2014, she learned that she’s capable of doing whatever she sets her mind to, and that she can be in a new environment with strangers and make them into friends. ARC was not Karla’s first experience of fitting into a new […]
Say “YES!” to Adventure Risk Challenge
“Am I really going to do this?” Brock Sanders asked himself. “Am I doing the right thing? What am I going to get out of this?” Adventure Risk Challenge (ARC) had offered Brock a spot in their leadership and literacy summer course, but he couldn’t imagine spending 40 days away from home, hiking through the […]