Each Castle Rock program accommodates only 8-12 students at a time, and with four professors and numerous support staff, students enjoy an incredibly personal experience. They know that their personal needs are taken seriously and that they can receive exactly the kind of encouragement and guidance they may require. The Institute strives to balance and integrate scholarship and wilderness adventure (unlike other wilderness programs), and believes that this can realize significant benefits.

This kind of intimacy, combined with significant time outdoors, provides a fantastic opportunity for self-reflection and growth. It offers many ways to examine and discuss what assumptions and concerns a student has, and to do so in the context of a caring community of peers. Gaining this kind of self-awareness leads quite naturally to increased self-esteem and confidence, and ordinarily propels students to new levels of achievement.

The Castle Rock Institute wilderness programs organize for its residents a variety of wilderness programs and adventure activities. Leaving the program, scores of our past students have gone on to college (or back to college) revived and inspired. They've gone on to be more creative and more disciplined in their studies, more grounded in their social interactions, and generally more satisfied with who they are and where they're headed. The Castle Rock Institute provides exactly this kind of therapeutic program. It provides college students and their families an opportunity to revive enthusiasm for learning, build inter-personal skills, and live a balanced life of personal, intellectual and physical challenges and rewards. It is for most, a life-changing experience.

An Alternative Wilderness Experience

The Castle Rock Institute is an outdoor adventure education organization that offers residential wilderness programs for college students. It recognizes that being a college student is not always easy, and that for many students, college life or simply trying to make it on a university campus leads to a whole range of problems. When a student has trouble adjusting to college, is burned out, or perhaps has lost interest in being at school, the Castle Rock programs can offer a real and beneficial alternative. Our programs are designed to address the needs of college students as they face the possibility of dropping out (or flunking out!) because they have had difficulty finding the right school, been distracted by personal or social pressures, or suffered from low academic achievement, poor grades, or performing far below their potential.

The general mission of the Castle Rock Institute involves a unique combination of features. We sponsor semester-long study programs for college students that combines wildreness activities and courses in the Humanities. This is a wilderness programs offering like no other.