December 3rd 2013
What an amazing year! It has been a year full of innovation and deepening of traditions for UrbanTrekkers. I’m overwhelmed with both gratitude and joy that I feel from being surrounded by staff, friends, volunteers, and students. As we work with our youth and deepen our relationships with them, we realize that we don’t just help to transform the lives of our students. We also see transformation in our own lives.
Those transformative relationships grow through nights around campfires, hikes in beautiful places, and hours working in the shop side by side building boats. These are the places where we find our true selves. These are the places we become who we were made to be.
Our youth and mentors reached new heights in 2013 as the year provided many new and exciting opportunities. This year for the first time ever, we held an expedition where UrbanTrekkers from UrbanPromise Ministries in multiple cities came together for a two-week, 2,500 mile expedition through five national parks in Colorado and Utah. We’ve begun to create a training and support model for UrbanPromise staff and interns to lead the way in outdoor education in their own cities.
More students than ever walk around campus wearing their Trekker Vest as a symbol of honor earned through hard work and grit. The walls of the UrbanPromise Academy high school display the student plaques with their badges of achievement earned over their high school careers for things like backpacking, paddling, and boatbuilding. From new student orientation to the Senior Rites of Passage, we mark the journey with time-tested traditions.
We now host over 50 students in the boat shop building traditional skiffs, cedar strip kayaks, and stitch and glue paddleboards and canoes. The students in our advanced build exhibit craftsmanship and a maturing confidence in the quality of the craft they produce.
All that being said, we could never build relationships and character in our students without your love and support. This year has been remarkable because of you. For this we are abundantly grateful.
Jim Cummings
Director of Experiential Learning