How La Vida Prepares Gordon College Students for Academic and Life Success 

A cherished differentiator of the Gordon experience is the outdoor education requirement: Every Gordon graduate has spent either half a semester in a team-building class or nearly two weeks backpacking in the Adirondack Mountains. Both programs are signatures of the La Vida Center for Outdoor Education at Gordon College, which has been a bedrock of the student experience at Gordon for over 50 years and has its roots in Young Life and Outward Bound School. 

Why does Gordon require such a strenuous achievement for students? Newly minted faculty member Abby Stroven used a recent faculty forum on September 25, 2024 at Gordon to explore the methodology behind La Vida and share how it has impacted thousands of Gordon students for the better. 

The Psychology Behind Outdoor Education 

La Vida is a part of the Gordon curriculum because of the College’s dedication to holistic growth through experiential learning for its students: mental, physical, emotional, social and spiritual. Research shows that participating in an outdoor orientation program during the first year of college provides a sense of belonging, trust and connection that is beneficial during such a significant transition.  

“So much of what outdoor education does is helped by the role of the natural environment, because that’s something we can’t really control,” Stroven said. “There’s also somatic learning where you learn something by physically doing it. That physical action creates muscle memory and allows you to learn in a different way.”  

Besides reducing stress and enhancing focus, time spent outdoors encourages students to see God and his creation in a whole new way amidst our rapidly developing world. And since La Vida became a part of the Gordon First-Year Experience, students enter college life in a unique community built on trust, overcoming fears and learning to thrive in the wilderness. 

“La Vida connects to our core learning outcome, which is to demonstrate a knowledge of God’s character and purpose as revealed in Scripture,” Stroven said. “We read verses in Scripture that say things like, ‘Bear one another’s burdens.’ Then you go on a La Vida trip, and you actually have to bear somebody’s burden because they can’t carry the weight of the gear. And now you are helping them by sharing the load and carrying most of their weight. So it has a different connotation when you get to live out God’s truth on the trail that really sticks with you.” 

The Benefits of Outdoor Education 

La Vida comes from the Spanish saying “eso es la vida,” meaning, “this is the life,” and La Vida’s impact on lives has proven invaluable. Five dissertation studies on La Vida’s programs found students who participated showed increased academic diligence and love for learning, confidence towards future challenges, higher participation in campus life, more openness to diversity, better coping strategies for stress, a positive relationship with failure and a firmer commitment to moral values.  

Feedback from students attests to the program’s positive influence. According to anonymous student survey responses: “La Vida applies to my academics as well, prioritizing what needs to be done but remaining in the moment with life;” “I believe this trip helped me with my relationships at college;” “I’m intentionally taking time in the week to have times of silence and solitude outside to help me slow down and decompress and listen to God.”  

“Our students are taking the things they’re learning in La Vida, and they’re applying it,” Stroven said. “This is also part of Gordon’s vision to graduate men and women of distinguished intellectual maturity and Christian character committed to lives of service. All of what we’re doing here is really helping the overall mission of learning; we’re supporting student development and fostering that sense of community and belonging.” 

Many students return after their first year to work for La Vida as wilderness guides or Discovery teaching assistants. La Vida has also helped others build careers far from the trails of the Adirondacks. Stroven recalls several engineers who led Adirondack programs for three years as students, then got promoted to the highest positions in their post-college careers. “They understood how to manage teams and manage people beyond just being engineers, so it is valuable what students are learning on these experiences. It translates to career opportunities,” she said. 

La Vida Lives On 

La Vida is a Gordon graduation requirement because it enables students to demonstrate a knowledge of God’s character and purpose as revealed in Scripture. “Our participants do that every day,” Stroven said. “There’s devotional time. Every day they’re talking and in community, reflecting on God’s promises and his character. They’re demonstrating a knowledge of God’s creation by being in nature and understanding how to care for it. They’re demonstrating effective oral and written communication because we do ask them to talk in class and write reflection papers.” 

From spending time as Leader of the Day, sharing ACEs (affirmations, challenges and exhortations), two-day solo fasts and final celebrations full of moving testimonials, La Vida plans to continue and expand its unconventional but transformational work, growing Christian college students closer to God and to the outdoors. La Vida runs outdoor adventure camps in Wenham each summer and Adirondack trips for schools all across New England and has partnered with schools like Boston College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. And one day, it might expand its courses into Ecuador as well.  

“I hope that one day, we could have an outdoor education, minor or concentration as well,” Stroven said. “Since La Vida has helped our students reach academic success, we want to cross-pollinate our curriculum with other departments so our students are learning experientially as much as possible, whether indoors or outdoors.”