Sierra Club Houston Group Inner City Outings

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Sierra Club Inner City Outings is a community outreach program that provides opportunities for urban youth and adults to explore, enjoy and protect the natural world.

ico2.jpg (11841 bytes) Inner City Outings (ICO) is a community outreach program of the Sierra Club that provides low-income, inner city youth with trips to wilderness. The Sierra Club San Francisco Bay chapter established the first ICO group in 1971. Today, a dedicated core of volunteer leaders located in approximately 50 cities across the United States work with local social service agencies and schools to provide wilderness experiences for people who otherwise might not have them.

With the guidance of ICO volunteer leaders, participants discover the beauty of wild lands and how to enjoy these places without harming them. Young people learn valuable survival skills and develop the ability to face challenges outside their urban environments. Interpersonal skills and self-esteem grow as a natural result of teamwork and an active relationship with the outdoors.

ico3.jpg (17498 bytes) Sierra Club ICO volunteers are certified and trained in recreational, outdoor, and safety skills as well as environmental education. ICO leaders enable youth of diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds, hearing or visually impaired, and the physically disabled to backpack, participate in neighborhood cleanups and/or naturalist-led hikes through local marshes and meadows. ICO volunteer leaders introduce all people to the natural world.

ico4.jpg (3028 bytes) To preserve and protect the wilderness for future generations, it is vital that the environmental community engages people of wide-ranging ethnicities, cultures, and abilities. The Sierra Club, through the Inner City Outings program, hopes to infuse the environmental community with the power of diversity.

For information on how you can support or participate in the Houston ICO program, contact Lorraine Gibson at 281-384-4104 or e-mail raineygib@aol.com.

Houston ICO: Glacier Institute Summer Trip
Houston Inner City Outings (ICO) hosted twenty-nine students from KIPP Houston High School and seven students from Chinquapin High School, who spent two weeks at the Glacier Institute's Big Creek Outdoor Education Center in Montana. Twenty of these students backpacked for six days in the Jewel Basin of the Bob Marshall Wilderness. Houston ICO provided five of the ten adult leaders. (Sep 07) More==>

Houston Inner City Outings: Women in the Wild
From January 21st to the 23rd , the young women of Chinquapin School with great enthusiasm and optimism spent a weekend with Sierra Club Houston Inner City Outings leaders, Angie Langolf, Lorraine Gibson, and Ave Rojas at the Brazos Bend State Park. The all female group set up camp under an unpredictable sky and put their faith in Nature's plan. Threats of rain and freezing temperatures did not quiet their laughter or curb their curiosity. (Apr 05) More==>

Inner City Outings - Houston ICO Fishing Trip
On November 6th, twenty-six 4th and 5th graders from I Have A Dream-Bastain Elementary were treated to a day of outdoor fun at Sheldon Lake State Park. When Houston Inner City Outings planned this trip, we had no idea it would be a sunny day just perfect for fishing. (Feb 05) More==>

ICO Big Bend Trip
Sierra Club Houston's Inner City Outings group coordinated the National ICO Regional Outing to Big Bend National Park October 26-30th. Youth from Denver and Austin participated with Houston inner city youth. (Feb 01) More==>

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