Which Workshop?

                                                                                              

Which workshop is right for you and your group involves a few factors; primarily participants of the workshop and their interests, though also length of workshop, and location of workshop.

Participants Interest and Ability Level. Considering the participants interest one should consider the motivations abilities of the participants. The motivation of the participants may be for a particular skill such as is presented in the Fundamental Skills – knife, fire, clothing, or shelter skills. The Combination Workshops joins several of the fundamental skills into all around skills for either a fun Discovery experience or a more intentional needs based emergency management Overnight skills experience. The Self-Reliance Workshops focus on more involved skills that may be used for more long term backcountry experiences.

Workshop Length. The length of a workshop may vary from a few hours to a several days. The Discovery workshop is available in 4 or 8 hour formats. The Overnight Skills Workshop and all of the The Fundamental Skills Workshops are all available in one or two day formats. The Self Reliance workshops are as short as two days and as long as 5 days.

Workshop Location. The workshop location is the most variable component of the decision. It can be held in you backyard or mine, figuratively speaking, or anywhere in between. Quite often organizations have me come to them since it is easier for them to coordinate all of the participants closer to home. Families frequently have workshops in my area as they are traveling through on a vacation though I have frequently come to a family’s location as well. Finally, some folks have a place somewhere else that meets the needs of the organization of family where we hold the workshop.

Private Workshops or Open Enrollment. the type of enrollment in the workshop is another consideration to be discussed though it is not typically a primary decision component. The vast majority of workshops I conduct are private events for families, clubs such as scouting groups, backcountry organizations such as Search and Rescue, businesses such as medical helicopter teams and universities, or organizational team building events. I also participate in events organized by other businesses for open enrollment such as traditional skills gathering.

Large Groups.  I can accommodate workshops with large groups.  I engage other instructors when I work with large groups to make sure we have an appropriate participant to Instructor ratio. This of course means that additional lead time may be needed to make arrangements with the other instructors.

We will take the time to discuss all of these decision factors as we do the initial planning for a workshop.