Outdoor Education Camps
If asked, most students will mention their outdoor education experience as a special highlight of their life at ͼ.
Preparation for Life
Outdoor education as a tool for student development is embedded across the Middle and Senior learning journey at ͼ. Our outdoor education program has been designed to foster personal, spiritual and social development in our students.
Strategically delivered outdoor education experiences range from day camps to a four week experience that places students outside their comfort zone and stimulates personal growth.
Students emerge from their outdoor education experiences with new strengths, an enhanced sense of purpose, unshakable friendships, an understanding of the value of teamwork and a mature sense of their relationship with God.
Benefits of Outdoor Education
Outdoor education aims to give students the opportunity to learn outside the classroom and to cope with the pressures of life such as dealing with responsibilities, failure and success.
Students experience a bush lifestyle and experience time spent away from the comforts of home.
Other benefits include learning to appreciate their families, gaining a better understanding of self, making new friends, heightening acceptance of others and developing new skills.
Year 9 Googa Experience
Each year, Concordia’s Year 9 classes spend four weeks at Googa Outdoor Education & Christian Retreat, undertaking a program administered by teachers and outdoor education specialists.
There is an emphasis on physical tasks including hiking, orienteering, abseiling, rock-climbing, canoeing, gardening and basic survival tasks such as cooking, cleaning and washing.
Each student’s mind and spirit is also exercised through initiative activities, problem solving games and periods of quiet reflection.
During the outdoor education experience, there are no radios or televisions, electronic devices, soft drinks or sweets. Surprisingly, students often appreciate “getting away from it all”, making their own entertainment and enjoying the quiet of the bush.
The Outdoor Education experience is a compulsory element of the Year 9 curriculum at Concordia.