Fox Mountain Guides

and Climbing School

The Southeast's only AMGA Accredited Climbing School

Rock, Ice Climbing Guides and Rock Climbing Courses in North Carolina

WNC Summer Camp Climbing Director Seminar

This is a seminar designed to gather Summer Camp Climbing Directors together who administer climbing programs that operate in Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina State Parks and privately owned land in WNC. It will be a chance to look at and discus relevant current topics, equipment and safety practices in single pitch rock climbing programs. USFS Ranger Linda Randolph, head of USFS Special Use Permits in Pisgah National Forest will be attending and giving a presentation at the Seminar.

Overview of Proposed Topics:

	Where to climb in WNC. Where we allowed to climb, who are the land managers and what are the permit regulations for the various land managing agencies (as it pertains to rock climbing).
	Climbing Equipment. Use, limitations, storage, record keeping. A look at ‘good’ and ‘poor’ gear available for commercial climbing use. Detailed look at use, storage and record keeping for institutional programs.
	Current ‘Industry Standards’ Overview of current standards and prudent safe practices in current use in institutional climbing programs across the USA and around the world. This will include discussions on everything from climbing equipment specifications to belay techniques.
	Leave No Trace as it relates to climbing groups. What we can do to reduce impact.
	Rock Site Group Management. Group management at climbing sites.
	Base Managed Rock Climbing Sites. Overview of a standard base managed rock climbing site. Looking at ratios, use of ground anchors, belay backups, risk management strategies.
	What went wrong? A detailed look at near misses, accidents and fatalities in rock climbing programs (and recreational accidents) over the last few years. What went wrong and how we can prevent these accidents happening in our programs.
	Questions and Reviews. A time for questions on anything to do with institutional climbing.

Reasons for Offering this Seminar: This will be my 15^th season working as the climbing director for a local WNC Summer Camp and I wanted to offer a workshop for climbing directors to try and answer all the questions I had my first few years. I also hope it will be a time for climbing program directors and instructors from the various camps in WNC to get together and network with each other. I train climbing instructors and guides on courses at Fox Mountain Guides and Climbing School and work for the American Mountain Guides Association teaching climbing guides at various locations around the country and I want to share my knowledge with other climbing instructors.

The seminar, while I hope very beneficial, is not climbing staff ‘training’. The workshop is not meant to be a replacement for any training your camp staff would receive either internally or externally to prepare them to take groups of young people into the wilderness and facilitate rock climbing in technical terrain. This seminar alone will in no way prepare a climber/novice climbing instructor to instruct rock climbing in WNC. We will not cover multipitch climbing. This Seminar has no certification linked to it and is not an 'AMGA training or certification' course. For AMGA Climbing Instructor training click here: AMGA Single Pitch Instructor Course.

The following two days after the Seminar we will be holding two training courses:

Rock Climbing Instructors Workshop (2 days)

AMGA/CWA Climbing Wall Instructor Certification (2days)

and the following weekend we will be offering the national standard of training and certification for climbing instructors working on single pitch cliffs in the USA:

AMGA Single Pitch Instructor Certification Course (3 days)

Please check out these courses for your staff training this summer and call or email the FMG office with any questions about our training and AMGA certification courses.

WNC Summer Camp Rock Climbing Director Seminar Prerequisites:

Applicants must be a WNC Summer Camp Climbing Director, one representative from each camp only please.

Number in Seminar: Maximum of 12 participants

Seminar length: One day

Seminar dates: Monday 19th May

Cost: $50 per participant

Email to book this course

Call 1-888-284-8433 or email with questions about this course

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Email: info@foxmountainguides.com Toll Free: 1-888-28-GUIDE (48433)

Rock Climbing Guides, instruction and courses offered by the Southeast’s only AMGA Accredited Climbing School,

Fox Mountain Guides and Climbing School North Carolina NC.