What happens when a child steps into Yosemite National Park for the first time?
For thousands of students each year, that first experience comes through NatureBridge, where Yosemite becomes something more than a national park they have seen in photographs or learned about in school. It becomes an outdoor classroom filled with granite walls, waterfalls, forests, wildlife and opportunities to discover what they are capable of doing outside.
In this Sierra Rec Now conversation, host Charlie Pankey talks with NatureBridge Yosemite Campus Director Corinne Dedini and Yosemite Operations Manager Andrés Escalante about outdoor education in Yosemite, introducing kids to camping and backpacking, getting young people away from screens, and what happens when students are given the opportunity to experience wilderness for themselves.
For parents, teachers and school communities in California and Nevada looking for ways to get kids outdoors, their stories offer an interesting look at what can happen when education leaves the classroom and enters one of the world’s great outdoor spaces.
Our Guests
Corinne Dedini & Andrés Escalante | NatureBridge
Corinne Dedini serves as Yosemite Campus Director for NatureBridge, helping lead an outdoor education program that brings thousands of young people into Yosemite National Park each year.
Andrés Escalante serves as Yosemite Operations Manager and works directly with programs that introduce students to outdoor experiences, including WildLink wilderness and backpacking trips.
Together, Corinne and Andrés offer two perspectives on the same mission: giving young people meaningful experiences outside and helping them develop curiosity, confidence, community and a stronger connection with the natural world.
NatureBridge provides hands-on environmental science programs for young people in national parks. Its Yosemite programs combine outdoor learning, environmental science, stewardship and opportunities for students to experience one of America’s great national parks firsthand.
Watch: NatureBridge and Kids in Yosemite
Prefer to listen? Listen to this conversation on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast platform.
Seeing Yosemite for the First Time
There is something different about seeing Yosemite through the eyes of someone experiencing it for the first time.
Corinne describes watching students arrive in Yosemite and seeing their faces change as they encounter the granite walls, waterfalls and river around them. Andrés has seen that first encounter produce everything from excitement to a sense of being overwhelmed by the enormous scale of the landscape.
But NatureBridge isn’t simply bringing students to Yosemite to look at famous scenery.
The park becomes their classroom.
Students explore science and environmental education outside, learning about Yosemite’s ecosystems while beginning to understand one of the themes NatureBridge educators return to again and again: everything is connected.
The lessons become tangible because students can see, touch and experience what they’re learning rather than simply reading about it.
Sometimes It’s the Squirrel They Remember
Yosemite has some of the most recognizable landscapes in the world, but Andrés says it isn’t always Half Dome, Yosemite Falls or a massive granite wall that captures a student’s attention.
Sometimes it’s a squirrel.
A student who has never spent much time outside may become completely fascinated by an animal or a tree that another visitor barely notices.
Those small discoveries matter.
Andrés has heard from students who return home and begin noticing the trees around them differently. Some discover that taking a walk outside helps when they’re stressed. Their Yosemite experience begins changing how they notice nature in their own neighborhood.
That may be one of the most interesting lessons in the entire conversation.
A young person doesn’t necessarily have to return to Yosemite to continue the experience. Sometimes Yosemite simply teaches them to notice what has been around them all along.
What Happens When the Phones Go Away?
For many young people, several days in Yosemite also means stepping away from the constant presence of phones, social media and screens.
Corinne describes the difference that can make.
Instead of experiencing the world primarily through a device, students begin engaging their other senses—the sound of the Merced River, fresh air, changing weather and the enormous physical scale of Yosemite Valley.
Nature doesn’t have to compete for their attention in quite the same way.
The goal isn’t simply to take a phone away. It is to give young people something meaningful enough to replace it.
For some students, that experience becomes the beginning of a much longer relationship with being outside.
Taking the First Step Into the Backcountry
NatureBridge’s WildLink program takes that idea another step by introducing young people to wilderness and backpacking.
Andrés says roughly 99 percent of the students he takes into the backcountry through WildLink have never been to Yosemite, gone camping or gone backpacking before.
That creates an obvious challenge: you can’t introduce someone to backpacking if participating first requires a family to purchase an entire collection of outdoor equipment.
NatureBridge helps remove that barrier by providing the gear students need, including items such as boots, socks, sleeping bags and tents.
Students can arrive without already knowing how to be backpackers.
They learn by becoming backpackers.
The Fears Aren’t Always About Bears
One of the most revealing moments happens around the campfire.
Andrés describes an activity where students anonymously write down their hopes and fears about the experience.
The fears aren’t necessarily what experienced backpackers might expect.
Students worry about whether they will keep up.
Whether they’ll let the group down.
Whether they’ll fit in.
Those fears turn the backpacking trip into something larger than miles traveled or a destination reached.
Trips don’t always go according to plan. Equipment can fail. Weather can change. A group may attempt something and have to turn around.
And yet Andrés says those imperfect experiences can become the trips students remember most.
A young person who begins the experience wondering whether they belong can leave saying something very different:
“These are my people.”
Crossing the Courage Line
Corinne describes part of NatureBridge’s work as helping young people “cross the courage line.”
Outdoor experiences provide a place where students can take a risk, try something unfamiliar and discover that being uncomfortable doesn’t automatically mean they don’t belong.
That might mean sleeping outside for the first time.
Carrying a backpack.
Trying to climb toward a destination and turning around.
Being away from home.
Or simply learning how to exist without the normal noise surrounding everyday life.
The wilderness provides room for young people to see themselves differently—and sometimes to discover a community they didn’t know they were looking for.
NatureBridge’s work in Yosemite reaches approximately 13,000 students each year, many of whom receive scholarship support. The organization began as the Yosemite Institute in 1971 after a science teacher brought his students to Yosemite and recognized the possibilities of teaching outside.
More than five decades later, the basic idea remains remarkably simple:
Sometimes a child’s relationship with the outdoors begins because somebody gives them the opportunity to take that first step.
Keep Exploring With Sierra Rec
The Sierra doesn’t require you to be an expert before you begin.
Sierra Rec shares places to explore, trails worth discovering, practical trip ideas and conversations with people who can help you and your family experience the Sierra Nevada a little deeper.
Discover More about NatureBridge Programs
Learn more about NatureBridge: https://naturebridge.org/
Explore Yosemite programs: https://naturebridge.org/programs/yosemite-school-environmental-science
Learn about WildLink: https://naturebridge.org/wildlink
First Steps
This conversation is part of First Steps, a growing Sierra Rec collection exploring the people, experiences and practical knowledge that help make getting outside feel possible.
From a child’s first experience in Yosemite to a family’s first camping trip or someone’s first backpacking adventure, First Steps begins with a simple idea:
You don’t have to know everything before you start.
Hosted by Charlie Pankey of Sierra Rec Magazine.
