1. UMCUR presentation Reid Hensen Psychology Department, UM 4/28/2017
The Role of Wilderness Orientation Programs: What purpose do they serve?
UMCUR presentation
Reid Hensen
Psychology Department, UM
4/28/2017

2. What is an Outdoor Orientation Program?
Outdoor orientation programs (OOP) (Bell et al. 2014)
(a) Students are placed in small groups of 15 or fewer individuals;
(b) students spend at least 1 night camping away from campus in a “wilderness setting”
(c) the program includes one or more adventure experiences (e.g., hiking, rock climbing, canoeing, ropes course).

3. Current Understanding of OOP Effects (Bell et al. 2014)
Psychological growth/development
gained confidence, self-esteem, self-concept, self-efficacy, student adjustment, and spiritual development
Impact on social variables
social support, sense of community, and friendship formation
Which one is more impactful? The second. This is consistant with our findings.

4. Big “W” programs
Capital W Wilderness – Federally Designated Wilderness per the Wilderness Act of 1964
Wilderness- The colloquial term used for forested, natural, or rugged terrain
WOP VS. OOP
Are these the same? Are they distinguished in the literature?
The Northern Rockies Advantage

5. Place- UM Strategic Planning Partnership with Place What is Place?
Place attachment (Kyle et al. 2003)
Design student experiences that engage and promote our setting
Encourage and support the development of curricula, internships, certifications, and micro-certifications that study the nature and characteristics of western Montana as a place.
Support place-based collaborations with statewide land-management organizations, leveraging these relationships to situate research in Montana’s natural environment.
Provide course-release opportunities for faculty who seek to connect students and Montana’s natural spaces through dynamic learning and research endeavors.
Publicize our place-based research and student engagement as points of distinction.
Kyle et al. (2003b) captured the essence of this usage: “the extent to which an individual values or identi es with a particular environmental setting”

6. Resilience Being able to adapt to adverse conditions Dimensions
Temperament personality, self-efficacy, hardiness
Coping skills such as active problem solving
(Campbell-Sills, Cohan, & Stein. 2006).
We are interested in studying whether one can foster these specific skills that comprise a resilient individual.
five factors predict academic resilience: self-efficacy, control, planning, low anxiety, and persistence (Martin & Marsh 2006)

7. Self-Efficacy
A person’s belief in their capacity to successfully perform a task
Self efficacy increased as a part of outdoor orientation programs (Jones & Hinton, 2007)
Self efficacy increases can improve retention and intent to stay in a behavior (Gore et al. 2000)
It can correlate with resilience (Taylor & Reyes, 2012)
SCT explains behavior in organizations in terms of the reciprocal causation among the person (unique personal characteristics such as ability), the environment (consequences from the organizational environment such as pay for performance), and the behavior itself (previous successful or unsuccessful performances).

8. Student success
“You can have all the riches and success in the world, but if you don't have your health, you have nothing”- Steven Adler
Most often measured by attrition rates and GPA calculations
Health as an indicator?
Social and Emotional wellbeing relate to GPA and emotional factors like resilience and self-efficacy relate to attrition (Pritchard & Wilson, 2003)
The
first transition involves becoming “ready” for college and is measured by
educational aspirations or expectations and academic preparation for college.
The second transition is marked by enrollment into college and is measured
by college access and college choice. The third transition, college achievement,
is represented by academic performance in college, transfer among institu-
tions, and persistence to program or degree completion. The final transition,
postcollege attainment, is measured by enrollment in graduate and profes-
sional schools, income, and educational attainment.
Theoretical Perspectives on Student Success: Understanding the Contributions of the Disciplines
Perna, Laura W. ; Thomas, Scott L.
ASHE Higher Education Report, 2008, Vol.34(1), p.1-87

9. Our Hypothesis
H1: First-year student Wilderness orientation programs will lead to higher scores on the resilience measure than those who only engage in the standard university orientation program.
H2: Resilience will be correlated with individuals self-report nature usage.
H3: Self-efficacy and resilience will positively predict perceived student success.

10. METHODS

11. Mixed method approach: Quantitative
Pre F.W.E
1st Week of Classes
Mid-December
F.W.E Group
N=81
N=36
N=31
Standard Orientation --
N= 48
N=21
Two main constructs were used in the survey; the CD-RISC Resilience Measure and a college self-efficacy measure (Gore et. al, 2005)
Some example Resilience and Self-Efficacy Items
I am able to adapt when changes occur.
I have at least one close and secure relationship that helps me when I am stressed.
I try to see the humorous side of things when I am faced with problems.
Please rank your personal confidence levels to accomplish the following tasks during your first semester at the University of Montana:
Talk to your professors/instructors
Join a student organization
Socialize with others you live with

12. Mixed method approach: Qualitative
A second waive of data collection through semi-structured interviews with students who participated in FWE three years’ prior provides some insight.
snowball sampling.
Ex questions: “How have you navigated stressors or difficulties at UM?”
and

13. RESULTS

14. Study 1
H1: First-year student Wilderness orientation programs will lead to higher scores on the resilience measure than those who only engage in the standard university orientation program.
H2: We predict a correlation between resilience and self-report nature usage.
H3: We predict that self-efficacy will correspond with Resilience Levels
No significant differences in resilience or self-efficacy were found over time or between the traditional and wilderness orientation groups.

16. Results (cont.) Study 2 Sense of place
Connectedness to the local landscape
Strong connections to social groups

18. Success
“It means being comfortable with yourself and who you are and who you hang out with, and what type of person you think you are, and eating right, being body healthy, and obviously exercising. If you are happy with yourself than that’s your health.”
Survey- Self report Likert Scale
Interviews- Health and Success
“I think there are things that make me happy, and by doing that they have made me successful. I think just meeting a bunch of different people who are into different things, and different interests, is really exciting and really fun to be a part of, and so like that has made me successful because I have gotten to do things that I wouldn’t have done otherwise but I have also gotten involved in things.”

19. Navigate Stressors
Health
Social Support
Place

20. “Gave me a really good impression of Montana”
Drivers of success
Social support
Formal programs (wild, climbing wall, professor office hours, FWE)
Informal
Place
FWE made them feel grounded in Missoula
Learning about access to nature, being able to use nature as a tool for de stressing
“I would say I found a core, like core mentors when I first got here and I realized that knowing them was a really powerful thing and watching other people be successful in this town”
“FWE made me a lot more comfortable with the outdoors here and that connection to the outdoors has really helped me manage my stress in times of need as a student, it’s been my escape”
“Gave me a really good impression of Montana”

21. DISCUSSION Sense of Place at the University of Montana Social Support
Health and Success
Our findings help identify a need for two further areas of understanding.
What assumptions are made in the research of Outdoor Orientation Programs regarding Wilderness?
Further understanding into the drivers of student success as a product of health
Social support and place
We thought resilience would be the main indicator of success, our statistical tests show that it is not, but in qualitative understanding, we were able to find a few more things that may be driving student success.

22. Many Thanks Libby Metcalf- Faculty Advisor and Research Extraordinaire
Elizabeth Fricke- Director of the ODP
Rachel James – Assistant Director of the Wilderness Institute