Curriculum & Schedule

The course is comprised of reading materials and discussions, assignments with in-depth feedback and three virtual meetings.

The schedule is intentionally designed to keep the workload consistent, and we recommend that students stay on track. It’s not possible to “get ahead”, but it is possible to “fall behind”– we’ll release new materials when we’ve scheduled them.

If you get busy and miss a week, it’s not a problem — you’ll have access to the materials, and we’re happy to review any assignments submitted to us within twelve weeks of the start date.

In 2025, we’re running two spring sessions, starting on March 24th (closed), and May 19th.

Your “goal trip”

The first meaningful assignment is to select your “goal trip,” which will serve as a foundation for later topics and assignments so that the learning is not merely hypothetical — by the end of the course, you should be fully prepared to undertake this itinerary.

Start thinking about this trip now. We recommend that it be fully self-sufficient, i.e. you start with all of the gear and food that you’ll need to finish. If you are eyeing a thru-hike, it’d be best to select a one- to two-week crux section, and then repeat the same process for other sections later.