Some kids get gold stars for good grades and exceptional behavior, but the fifth-graders at Calvin Donaldson Environmental Science Academy get more than just stickers of appreciation - they get adventure. Whether it's hiking, climbing or cycling, each week the students who commit time to practice their math after school and who behave well in class are offered the opportunity to experience the great outdoors while learning a life sport.
Paul Ruhling, the Calvin Donaldson Environ-mental Science Academy teacher who began the "Adventure Club," says that for many of these students, it is their first time out of an urban landscape. "The things we take for granted ... it's a foreign world for them," he says. "We don't think anything about these experiences and they're even closer to the trails than we are - than someone who lives out in, say, Apison. They're like literally 4 ½ miles from Sunset Rock or Lula Lake, but most of them have never been.
"The way they stand on a bank and position themselves ... you can see it's so foreign to them. It's like us going on a ship in the rolling seas and we're like everywhere and sailors are walking like normal. But the kids adjust really quickly to it and I truly think that they discover what they've been missing. They really make a connection. You can almost hear an audible exhale, like 'Ahhhh, we're finally here.'"
Thanks to weekly volunteers, support from local philanthropist Franklin Farrow and a grant facilitated by Cycle Sports Concepts, the program at Calvin Donaldson has been off the ground since last fall with enough bikes, helmets and basic accessories for seven students. "Paul came to me just throwing out ideas about what we could do to get the kids involved and motivated to reach certain goals," says Eric Wagner, managing partner at Cycle Sports Concepts. "I think the Adventure Club is a great idea. It's different than your average after school program. We're introducing young children to bikes that maybe wouldn't have access to them otherwise."
Calvin Donaldson music teacher and Adventure Club volunteer Claire Stockman says that although experiencing new places and activities can be a challenge for the students, many of them have thrived in the outdoors more so than they have been able to in the classroom. "There's one student in particular. I'd say this student isn't a shining start academically, but when he's out on the trail, he can do anything. He's naturally great at the physical sports. It's really cool to see him have the opportunity to be good at something from the get go," she says. "Every kid deserves to have the opportunity to go on an adventure and it's fun to give them an opportunity to just...be. There is no wrong answer out there. They can't mess up."
Ruhling says that the makeup of students at Calvin Donaldson is about 98-99 percent urban, with many of the students coming from underprivileged inner-city families. "Their world is very small. Many of them are from Alton Park and they look at Lookout Mountain, but they've never been on Lookout Mountain. They look at Raccoon Mountain, but they've never been on Raccoon Mountain," he says. "They're always yelling at me like, 'Come on! Can't we just go one more time around?' or 'Can't we stay just a little bit longer?' - it's obvious that they need a connection to nature, they want a connection to nature. It's almost something spiritual that is finally being fulfilled... stillness. There's nothing manmade. No neon signs, no flashing lights, no screeching tires, no guns popping off, no real fears and anxieties that some of them do experience in their neighborhoods."
Not only does the program provide them with an escape, Ruhling says he believes that the desire to take part in the Adventure Club has helped encourage the students to behave well, making the classroom an easier place for teachers to teach and students to learn. "Sometimes good behavior is hard to quantify, but I think overall the Adventure Club has helped," he says. "Sometimes it's hard for them, the kids and even the adults - they live in the moment. I think that's a characteristic of people living in poverty. They don't think ahead to a week from now, three days from now. I try to remind them throughout the day, you know, 'I want to see you on the trail, I want to see you on the mountain,' just to put it back in their head that this is coming up. A lot of time their actions and emotions - it's just right now. We're just trying to change that a little bit so they think ahead to middle school, high school. Where are you going? Where are you going to college?
"We're really trying to get those kids thinking about college rather than, 'Am I going to survive high school?' We don't want them to just survive high school, we want them to leap into college and be ready for college - because so many kids aren't. When they leave high school there's an alarming dropout rate the first year of college. There's already an alarming dropout rate with urban high schools, but many of those who actually graduate still aren't ready, so we're just trying to get them there. The Adventure Club is just one small piece."
Before moving back to Chattanooga, Ruhling lived for 10 years in Durango, Colo., where he started his first successful after-school adventure club program. So successful, in fact, that some of his past students, such as 2013 Durango Junior Development Sweet Elite athlete Colton Michael Anderson and Stan's NoTubes Women's Elite Race Team member Kaila Hart, have grown to become national champion cyclists.
"Mr. Ruhling got me on a bike and taught me the basics of riding," says Hart. "I can't imagine how I would have gotten into cycling if it hadn't been for his encouragement and his willingness to spend extra time with us. In seventh grade, he always did a group ride every Thursday afternoon. I remember he told me I should race and I thought he was crazy. Then in high school, one of my friends did a race and said it was fun, so I did a race with her and I've been riding ever since."
Hart's cycling career developed quickly after her first race as a junior in high school - she was even chosen to represent the U.S. Mountain Bike Nationals team at the Mountain Bike World Championships in Champery, Switzerland, an honor only awarded to one other woman in the under-23 category in the United States. The 22-year-old budding cycling champ is now paying it forward by mentoring young athletes in a local youth development program and encouraging them to get outside. "I think for me, the after-school program was monumental. I just didn't have time to get caught up in a lot of stuff, like drugs, because I had that sport," she says. "I think that's what a lot of kids miss out on...having that group of friends that every Thursday or whenever, you get together and do this thing, whether it's cycling or running or whatever you choose to do. It can change kids' lives. It really can. It changed mine."
Ruhling's hope for the program is that it will give the kids an experience that they can take pride in and work toward each week, and that the experience will spark a love for the outdoors that will last a lifetime. So far, so good.
"We meet on Wednesdays each week, and last Halloween fell on a Wednesday. I thought, 'The kids are going to want to go trick or treating instead of riding.' And two boys came up to me that day and said, 'We're going riding. We'd rather go riding than go trick or treating.' It was really awesome," he says. "So, instead of taking them to the VW trail where we normally go, I took them up to Raccoon Mountain and went to the East overlook where you're looking over the Tennessee River and the city. I was getting the bikes and stuff out of the car and I didn't see the kids, so I started looking around to see where they went. They were at the fence just looking ... staring, not talking. They'd never seen the view from there. They just stayed there forever. They just wanted to soak it all in."
As the students have grown to appreciate the program and the outdoors, Ruhling's thoughts have turned to the future. What happens when the kids leave Calvin Donaldson? "It's sad because I'm not going to be able to be there to continue with them to middle school. It would be awesome if there were some other programs after middle school they could jump into," he says. "We have what it takes in this area to do it, but it just takes some people getting involved in the middle school level especially. We need to get them hooked in middle school, early like before they can drive a car. They might go away from mountain biking once they get a car, but once you get the bug in them, that itch, they'll return to the bike. I'd like to see a continuity here where kids that want to keep going in a program have somewhere they can go... but it would take a big effort by somebody."
For more information on the Calvin Donaldson Environmental Science Academy, visit www.hcschools.org/cdesa. For more information about the Adventure Club, email Paul Ruhling at ruhling_p@hcde.org.