UNCW

How would you like to spend three weeks in windswept Patagonia, summiting a 19,000-foot-high peak in the Andes, taking on Class III and IV rapids alongside a volcano — and picking up six college credits for adding this adventure to your academic experience?

The University of North Carolina-Wilmington (UNCW) is offering this 24-day course (EVS 485/592) during the upcoming winter 2018 break, and the classroom is as described above — Patagonia, a nearly 300,000-square-mile area shared by Chile and Argentina that features the imposing Andes mountain range, deserts, plains, rocky coastlines and ice fields. This pristine real estate is enormous, yet only 5 percent of the populations of both countries live there.

And it’s available to adventure-seeking Seahawks as the result of an academic partnership between UNCW and us — the Wilmington-based National Center for Outdoor & Adventure Education (NCOAE). Our renowned center promotes critical thinking, environmental stewardship, and the acquisition of technical outdoor skills through accredited outdoor and adventure-based experiential education courses.

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The National Center for Outdoor & Adventure Education (NCOAE) has forged an academic relationship with the University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW) that will see UNCW students earning up to six academic credits for participating in and completing educationally-focused backcountry expeditions thousands of miles from campus and lasting up to a month.

Beginning next spring, UNCW students can study in magnificent outdoor classroom settings that include Chile, Patagonia or Alaska. As a result of this accord between the university and our North Carolina-based outdoor adventure organization, these adventure courses are now counted among the approved academic activities for the university’s Department of Environmental Sciences (EVS) students.

The trio of field courses — timed to coincide with scheduled breaks during the University’s 2018/19 academic year — provide UNCW students with some serious hands-on outdoor activities and lessons that are pretty much guaranteed to (more…)

North Carolina native Adam Parish hails from a coastal town called Newport that is located about 100 miles northeast of our headquarters in Wilmington. He attends the University of North Carolina in Wilmington, where he is majoring in recreation, sports leadership and tourism management — a degree he expects to pick up next spring.

Prior to accepting an internship position here at The National Center for Outdoor & Adventure Education (NCOAE), Adam was a marine science technician with the United States Coast Guard. Our newest intern says his favorite pastimes include surfing, hunting, kayaking, and exercising.

As we often do on our blog, today we offer a brief and very informal synopsis of our newest NCOAE staffer. With that being said, and the only serious question posed at the outset of the interview, below are some winsome, hardly worthwhile queries we placed before our new intern. They’re included here mostly for our edification and entertainment, as well as for “look back material” that we can reference when Adam makes it to the big time in the field outdoor- and adventure-based experiential education:

NCOAE: Why did you apply to be an NCOAE recreation intern, and what do you hope to gain from the experience?

Adam Parish: I participated in one of NCOAE’s Wilderness First Aid courses and thought the staff as a whole was great. Individually, they were really knowledgeable, skillful and they created a fun learning atmosphere. I got to know more about the organization and its mission and I felt interning would be a great learning experience. Basically, I hope that by the end of the fall internship I will have expanded my technical wilderness skills and gained valuable hands-on experience in coordinating outdoor adventure education programs.

NCOAE: If you had super power strength, what would it be and why?

Adam: My superpower would be to have super speed. I just think it would be awesome.

NCOAE: What was the last costume you wore?

Adam: I don’t remember the last costume I put on. But I’m old and losing my memory.

NCOAE: On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being weirdest, exactly how weird are you and how did you get that way?

Adam: Probably a seven! Who knows how I got to be so weird, but being weird is fun. Besides, what constitutes normal these days?

NCOAE: A penguin walks through the door at NCOAE Headquarters wearing a sombrero. What does he say and why is he there?

Adam: He says he’s there to hang out with the awesome people who work here.

NCOAE: What do you think about when you’re alone in the wilderness?

Adam: I don’t think. I just kick back and relax!

NCOAE: Finish this sentence: In 10 years from now, I will be…

Adam: I’m planning on enjoying life to the fullest because life is short and that is the only way to live!