Northwood School students work in the kitchen at a local business, learning culinary skills. (Photo provided)

LAKE PLACID – Northwood School’s LEAP (learn, engage, apply, perform) program is a first-hand learning experience for underclass students grades nine through 11.

LEAP is designed to enrich students’ academic experience by providing unique experiential programs that serve to broaden horizons, further academic growth, and provide opportunities otherwise unavailable in a traditional course of academic study. Programing is intended to challenge students’ perspectives and understanding of the world they will someday lead.

Northwood is a local day and boarding school with a tradition of experiential learning. From its campus on Mirror Lake Drive, students have been getting out in the woods, on the lakes and into the mountains since its founding in 1905.

This year students at Northwood completed their week-long LEAP courses last month. Some studied the art and science of fly fishing, which included conducting research with the Ausable River Association, working with the Essex County Hatchery to stock 1,000 rainbow trout in Mirror Lake, and visiting Rachel Finn’s art studio in Wilmington. Others courses focused on organic farming and visited farms such as Asgaard Farm and Blue Pepper Farm to see how they operate.

Cooking 101 teamed up with local businesses Green Goddess and Cake Placid to help students learn how to make smoothies and cupcakes before they headed south to the Culinary Institute of America for another cooking class. Northwood alums, Kelsey Locke and Jeff Nemec, taught the Intro to the Adirondacks course. This group of students learned about the history of the park as well as tourism during their visits with ROOST, The Adirondack Council, and The Adirondack Research Symposium. The Adirondack Great Camps course explored several local great camps and met with local guideboat builder, Chris Woodward to learn how to make boats.

Local author, climber and teacher Don Mellor taught a course in mountain rescue where the culminating project was a simulated rescue on a 100-foot cliff. Lake Placid native, Chadd Cassidy played the “victim” during this rescue. Another Lake Placid native, Aerie Treska took some students canoe camping from Long Lake to Lower Saranac Lake with the help of her husband, Chris Pierce.

One student from that trip said, “This trip was a great opportunity to learn my place in the natural world and to realize what it is like to be included in a cohesive community in the woods.”

Although many courses utilized the Adirondack Park and its resources, two other courses took students abroad to Iceland or Tobago. The Iceland course focused on geothermal energy and geology while the Tobago group learned about marine ecology while getting certified in SCUBA. Both of these adventures left students with life-changing experiences.

One student said, “This experience opened my eyes to a whole new world I never knew existed. Night diving and seeing the bioluminescence was awe-inspiring.”

Northwood hopes to enhance the existing LEAP program to involve even more local businesses, resources and agencies.

For more information or to offer ideas, contact Director of LEAP, Marcy Fagan at faganm@northwoodschool.com.