OUR MISSION:
Equitable access to outdoor experiences for youth of color and low-income youth
Bay Area Wilderness Training envisions a generation of social and environmental leaders, inspired by positive and meaningful experiences in nature, who reflect the diversity of our local community.
What We Do:
NEWS
Coronavirus Update
To the BAWT Community: BAWT is taking serious precautions against the spread of COVID-19. Please see below for updates regarding BAWT events and how we are responding to the outbreak. BAWT Engagement Events - We are postponing our April 4th Spring Used...
BAWT Community Update
January 23, 2020 Dear BAWT Community, For the past six months, Liza Dadiomov, Director of Programs and Sierra Lawe, Director of Development have served as interim co-leaders of Bay Area Wilderness Training. During this period, the BAWT Board of Advisors created a...
The Impact of Participating in BAWT’s Snowshoeing Course
In December of 2018, I had the pleasure of participating in BAWT’s Snowshoeing Basics Course. Little did I know how incredibly impactful this course would be. My participation in the course resulted in life-changing experiences for several Bay Area youth and...
Outward Bound Youth Service Day
Bay Area Wilderness Training recently partnered with Outward Bound to host a service-learning how-to day at our Oakland Gear Library! These youth are part of California Outward Bound’s Youth Leadership Corps, which brings Bay Area high school students together...
Engaging Youth at the Brower Youth Awards
Bay Area Wilderness Training staff and volunteers had a great time engaging with youth at the 2019 Brower Youth Awards Ceremony! The Brower Youth Awards recognizes outstanding and emerging youth leaders representing accomplishments across the full spectrum of...
Climbing for Kids 2019 Recap
The summer of 2019 was the third summer for CSAA and AON employees of Northern California to participate in Climbing for Kids. A huge shout out to BAWT Board Member David Sheridan who spent countless hours planning trips, leading his colleagues and friends up Half...
Outdoor Leadership Training
We offer affordable outdoor leadership skills training for teachers and youth workers.
Free Outdoor Gear Library
Free high-quality outdoor gear loaned for free for youth groups, schools and community organizations serving disadvantaged youth.
Funding & Support
Offering scholarships for training courses, and grants to support trips with youth. Offering a supportive community of peers and guidance.
Why we do what we do
We help thousands of diverse Bay Area youth get outdoors on overnight camping trips each year.
Some of them have never seen the ocean or left their neighborhoods.
GET INVOLVED
Come to a Volunteer Night
Learn more at a Discovery Session
Join an Adventure for Kids (AFK) Team
Support our work
Get Trained
How we help you get youth outdoors
Summit Scholarship
We strive to keep our course registration fees low and we never want a lack of financial resources to become a barrier for eager youth workers or teachers who want to bring outdoor experiences to their communities. With this scholarship program, we hope to increase access to our programs for teachers and youth workers from under-represented and marginalized communities.
Richard Louv Minigrants
Through the generosity of our supporters, BAWT offers Richard Louv Minigrants annually in the amount of $250 each. These funds help youth organizations and schools to cover the cost of venturing into the outdoors with the youth that they serve. We call this the Richard Louv Minigrant program to honor our good friend, author Richard Louv, whose book inspired Bay Area Wilderness Training founder to get started with our work.
Featured youth worker
Testimonial
“I think it is very important for more youth to have the chance to experience the outdoors. Experiencing the outdoors for me was my ticket to cleaning my life up, and I think that this can be the case for more youth; they just need the opportunity to see it.”
– Terry Roy, Outdoor Coordinator, BAWT FLT Alumni
Our Generous Supporters
