The Mountain Center

The Mountain Center (TMC) is a nationally recognized and accredited 501(C)3 educational and therapeutic organization that, since 1979, has been dedicated to promoting personal discovery and social change among youth, adults, families, and groups through the use of creative learning experiences in wilderness, community, and cultural environments. Program designs are rooted in our Experiential Adventure and Community-Based Resiliency Model©, which focuses on healthy activities that build social competencies, positive values, and positive identity development, thus enhancing the resiliency skills of our participants. The Mountain Center provides therapeutic adventure (hiking, backpacking, rock climbing, rafting) and opportunities to connect with nature for youth in public schools, tribal communities, youth shelters, treatment centers, and youth in the juvenile justice system. We primarily focus on underserved and marginalized populations–helping youth (and adults) with tools and experiences that support building resiliency, overcoming adversities, and living healthier lives. Top accomplishments within the last few years have been the implementation of our Summer Youth Program which is s day camp adventure program and our Teen Adventure Program which is a day and overnight programming. Both of these programs have been in the summer months open to community youth and their families. Last year we strategically worked with local providers in our community to recruit families that would benefit from these services. Like all TMC programs, this program is at no cost to the people we are serving directly. Another accomplishment was that we have hired more staff in the last few years that represent even more the communities we are serving. We are proud of the staff team we have developed over the years and strive to diversify our team. Last, we had our pre and post-program survey evaluated by an outside researcher for fiscal years 2020, 2021, and 2022. It was found that our overall pre to post-survey findings indicated statistically significant increases in mean global resilience scores, as well as sub-scale scores related to cooperation and communication, self-efficacy, empathy, problem-solving, self-awareness, and goal-setting which highlighted positive youth development and increased resiliency after participating in our programs.