Courses

After studying the manual and talking with the Veterans Administration, I’m up to speed with the registration procedures for the GI Bill. It’s a simple, 3-step process.

Step 1: Fill out the registration form on our site.

Step 2: Email us a copy of your certificate of eligibility (sometimes called letter of eligibility).

Step 3: We fill out form 22-1999 and send it to the Eastern Retional Processing Office in Buffalo, NY.

Pretty simple.

I recently announced that we were changing our summer course lineup.  The new, revised summer lineup is now posted on our Calendar.  It includes:

• Woodsman Course – 6/10 – 6/16
• Bushman Course – 6/17 – 6/23
• Riverman Course – 6/24 – 6/30
• Teen Bushcraft & Survival Course – 7/8 – 7/14
• Family Bushcraft & Survival Course – 7/22 – 7/28
• Summer Survival Weekend Course – 8/4 – 8/5
• Outlander Wilderness Survival Challenge Course – 8/5 – 8/11
• Pack Basket Workshop – 8/11 – 8/12
• Expedition And Wilderness Cooking Intensive – 8/12 – 8/18
• Eco-Venturer Sustainable Camping Course – 8/12 – 8/18

For more details click through to the individual course pages from the calendar.  The Eco-Venturer will be taught by Paul Sveum.  Paul is also interested in adding a drum making workshop to his time with us this summer.  I’ll add details about this when they’re available.

Immediately following the Eco-Venturer, we’ll be starting the fall Wilderness Bushcraft Semester, part of our yearlong bushcraft immersion and our (XI) Expedition Instructor Certification Program.

It’s going to be a great summer!

We’re down to one available spot for January’s Winter Bushcraft Immersion course.  The course runs from January 8-21 at our field school in Masardis, Maine, and students have the opportunity to earn 5 undergraduate credits.

It’s definitely not a beginner’s course, as camp is roughly a mile snowshoe in from the road.  We’ll be camped in shelters and canvas tents, building individual survival shelters, making a variety of crafts, exploring deer yards and studying mammals and their tracks, learning about traditional winter gear, and enjoying the slow season with it’s short days.

Look for me to return to a more regular blogging schedule now that Thanksgiving is over.

From very early on, it was clear that bipedal locomotion was not going to be fast enough to keep pace with the hustle and bustle lifestyle of our hunter/gatherer ancestors. The desire to effortlessly transport heaping hunks of mastodon, to swiftly reach the local flint quarry, or to fulfill the need for a tranquil cardio workout must have been the motivation behind the creation of the bicycle well over a million years ago. While it is still mystery to modern scientists how early humans were able to produce chromoly tubing, what is clear is that bicycles and traditional Earth skills are a match made in Paleolithic heaven!

Alright, so maybe that’s not historically correct, but we think that there is something to the idea anyway. That’s why this year Jack Mountain is introducing a new course, designed to couple traditional bushcraft with modern bike travel and camping. This 7 day course is a mix of field school hands-on learning and biking and camping that will take you through the beautiful landscape of Aroostook County on country roads and rail trails.

For more information, visit the course page at jackmtn.com/bicycle

Part of the Journeyman Program will be a remote canoe trip.  We’ll be poling and lining upstream to a remote lake, where the loons will sing us to sleep at night.  Then we’ll take a week heading down-river getting back to the field school.  Along the way we’ll be fishing, camping, and living outdoors.

Classroom sessions and lectures are no substitute for getting out and doing it.

At the request of one of our students I’m updating our college curriculum and creating a course catalog for our immersion programs.  This first section is our field ecology and natural history curriculum.

Economic Field Botany (3 credits) - Edible, medicinal and other useful plants of Maine and surrounding territories.
Aided by an instructor, students will identify and press or photograph specimens of wild plants in the field. They will then perform extensive background studies on the plants, including their botany, uses, preparations, nutritional content, medicinal properties and historical uses and lore. Students will experiment with edible plants in order to gain an intimate knowlege of them that goes beyond abstract information. The emphasis is on seasonally-available resources.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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Mammal Tracking And Behavior (3 credits) – The natural history of the mammals of Maine and surrounding territories
Students will learn to locate, identify and interpret tracks and sign of the mammals of northern Maine and perform background studies on the habits and natural history of each. The selection of mammals studied is driven by sign identified in order to keep the curriculum tangible and practical.

Courses: Fall, Winter

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Barehand Meteorology (3 credits) – Introduction to air masses, weather patterns, clouds and forecasting.
An introduction into understanding the weather, students will study the natural processes that create weather and keep a daily weather journal recording the weather and making observational forecasts.

Courses: Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer

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Field Astronomy (3 credits) – Introduction to the stars; star lore, constellations and celestial navigation.
A survey of stars and the night sky visible to the naked eye. Students will identify and learn the lore of the stars and constellations, as well as use them to find directions and latitude.

Courses: Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer

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Field Icthyology (3 credits) - Freshwater fish of Maine and surrounding territories; their biology, habits and economic importance.
A survey of freshwater fish: their natural history, habits and economic importance, as well as angling strategies.

Courses: Spring, Summer

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Field Ornithology (2 credits) – Birds of Maine and surrounding territories. Identification, habits and song.
Field identification and natural history of common birds of Maine and surrounding territories.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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Forest Ecology (2 credits) – The web of life in the northern forest.
A survey of the concepts of forest ecology as applied to the northern hardwood and boreal forest.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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Winter Ecology (2 credits) - Plant and mammal adaptation to the frozen season.
A survey of the concepts of winter ecology and their effects on humans.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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Freshwater Ecology (2 credits) – The ecology of stream, pond, river and lake.
A survey of the scientific principles of freshwater ecology and their field applications to the fisherman, forager, and bushcraft enthusiast.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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Traditional Ecological Knowledge (2 credits) - Ecology as understook by indigenous cultures.
Examines the traditional ecological knowledge and resource management of the Cree compared and contrasted with the modern science of ecology.

Courses: Spring, Summer, Fall

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More specifics are available in our book First Person Ecology.

Courses:

Fall: Wilderness Bushcraft Semester (Yearlong Immersion)

Winter: Winter Bushcraft And Snowshoe Expedition (Yearlong Immersion)

Spring: Canoe Expedition Semester (Yearlong Immersion)

Summer: Journeyman Course (standalone immersion)