Ancient Skills .
Wild Hearts.
Strong Futures.
Our Vision
A wilderness community rooted in connection, curiosity, and authentic mentorship.
At Gallatin Wilderness School, we offer immersive outdoor experiences for kids —through summer camps and weekly homeschool programs.
This is a return to something we already know.
We believe children don't just need more time outside.
They need a relationship with the land.
A relationship built through exploration, responsibility, reciprocity, gratitude, play, challenge, and reverence.
We are cultivating something deeper—belonging.
Gallatin Wilderness School is a place to step away from screens, schedules, and the noise of modern life and return to what matters.
Through place based education we will explore hands on learning that covers fire building, friction fires, water filtration, shelter building, animal tracking, and plant identification. But most importantly we will be fostering a relationship with the natural world around us.
Wild places. Real skills. Strong community. A life deeply connected and meaningful.
Philosophy
Coyote Mentoring is a name for an old idea: children learn nature best not through lectures, but through questions, stories, games, and direct experience that draw out their own curiosity — the way a coyote might lead you to notice something without ever pointing at it directly.
This approach was shaped by naturalist and tracker Jon Young, founder of the Wilderness Awareness School, who studied for years under tracker Tom Brown Jr. and the elder Ingwe. Jon wove those mentorships together into what's now known as the 8 Shields Model — a way of designing nature-connection programs around eight directions, each holding a different mood and purpose across a day or a season.
Out of this came the routines this program is built on: sitting still long enough to notice, asking questions instead of giving answers, singing and storytelling around a fire, and returning to the same wild places again and again until they start to feel like home.
Gallatin Wilderness School brings this lineage to the Gallatin Valley — practiced outdoors, rain or shine.
We are looking for our forever home.
Gallatin Wilderness School is also currently seeking its forever home. If you or someone you know may have a lead on land or a space that could support this vision, we would be deeply grateful to hear from you.
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