Vida Verde promotes educational equity by providing FREE overnight environmental learning experiences for students who don’t otherwise get the opportunity. Since 2001, we have served over 11,500 fourth through sixth grade students from low-income, Bay Area schools with our core program—a three-day, two-night camping trip (taken as a class during the school year) that is specifically designed to positively and powerfully impact students’ connection to the outdoors, academics, and social and emotional learning.
Vida Verde has a proven track record of achieving remarkable results with students from low-income schools through our high-quality and mission-driven outdoor education program coupled with strong organizational effectiveness and smart financial planning. Many of Vida Verde’s students have never spent multiple days away from home or in the outdoors, and they come with fears and specific needs that must be met before higher-level learning can be successful. We achieve exceptional outcomes with our students because of our extensive experience working solely with underserved youth and under-resourced schools as well as our drive to continuously improve. We have developed a program structure and educational philosophy for our core program that meets our students’ unique needs, and thus maximizes their success.
We work to ensure Vida Verde student view nature as a place FOR them; a place they have a fundamental right to access, and a place that influences them as leaders to vote, act and spend with the environment in mind.