Our first overnight to Golden Gate Canyon State Park was a blast! For most of the students it was their first time camping overnight in a tent. We practice many skills including map and compass skills, fire skills, leave no trace principles, cooking, and nature awareness. We also went on a long hike and few… Read more »
Posts By: Ford Church
CI Merchandise
Welcome to the Cottonwood Institute Store where you can shop with a conscience! We have partnered with amazing organizations to set up an online store so our students can get the gear they need for our courses and visitors can shop for the holidays, birthdays, and special occasions. Everyone can feel great about their purchases… Read more »
Academic Resources
The Cottonwood Institute’s educational philosophy is based upon two major tenets: environmental education and service-learning. We wanted to take the opportunity to define these and other pedagogical approaches and techniques used to teach our educational programs. These definitions offer a very broad explanation to complex terms, but attempt to synthesize these key terms into understandable… Read more »
Recommended Books
Cottonwood Institute educational programs address a variety of topics including essential camping and wilderness survival skills, environmental education, and changing the world. We have had several requests for book recommendations, so we have compiled the following list that we have in our library. We recommend buying your books through a company called Book Sense, an… Read more »
Photos From 1st quarter of CAP
Want to see pictures from the second overnight? The Action Project? Otherwise… this is the place! Click here.
CAP Pre-Course Survey, 2nd Quarter 2008
Welcome to the Community Adventure Program. Before we get started, we need to get some feedback about your outdoor experience, your thoughts about the environment, your community, etc. Please answer this survey honestly and to the best of your ability. The good folks who fund this class use this information to assess the performance of… Read more »
Pre-Course Survey, 2nd Quarter 2008
Welcome to the Community Adventure Program. Before we get started, we need to get some feedback about your outdoor experience, your thoughts about the environment, your community, etc. Please answer this survey honestly and to the best of your ability. The good folks who fund this class use this information to assess the performance of… Read more »
CAP Post Course Survey, 1st Quarter 2008
As the quarter comes to a close, I wanted to get some open and honest feedback from this class about how to improve the CAP for future students. This information will not affect your grade, but please take it seriously. It will be reviewed by the school, the Cottonwood Institute, and this information will help… Read more »
Trash!
Our class has decided to tackle the problem of trash at Manual High School and the neighborhood. As we begin to formulate our plan, we need to do some research into what other people are doing, what resources are out there, and how we can motivate people to stop littering. Click on the links below… Read more »
Mustache Madness!
Ford Church, Founder and Executive Director of the Cottonwood Institute, is an amazing man who sadly does not have the ability to grow facial hair. But this October, despite the odds, Ford will be attempting to grow a mustache! Why would he want to do such a silly thing you ask? Well, for Mustache4Cash of… Read more »
