TIMBERTOP

The most important challenge at Timbertop is hiking – students traverse mountainous terrain in the Alpine National Park, can cover more than 20 kilometres in a day, ascending and descending between 800-1,000 metres, subject to snow and adverse weather conditions, and sometimes arriving at their campsite in darkness. In total, our Timbertop students camp for more than 50 nights during the year. The lessons learned in the outdoors are profound and often life changing.

“There are lots of elements of the Timbertop experience that are designed to develop resilience,” Annabel Bainger (Southey, Cl’02), Campus Director Student Welfare - Girls, explained. “The Outdoors Programme is specifically designed to challenge students. Sometimes we get suggestions that if the hikes were easier, the kids would enjoy hiking more. But that’s not the purpose. The students are very purposefully pushed outside their comfort zone; socially, mentally and physically. The Outdoors Programme is the foundation for building resilience.”

For some students, the challenge begins with choosing a hike group – a small group of 6-8 students that hike and camp together. Laura Kearley (Timbertop’03), Campus Head of Learning and Teaching/Head of D Unit, said that choosing a hike group is a powerful example of student agency that can also be “a pretty challenging social dynamic”. “For some students it can be quite intimidating and nerve-wracking,” Laura said. “It can be like choosing a sports team on steroids.” As hikes progress in difficulty and duration throughout the year, students will spend multiple days hiking together, setting up camp, preparing meals and sharing a tent. “When you choose a tent buddy you literally get a cattle tag zip-tied with somebody else’s; you can’t pull apart, you have to work together,” Annabel explained. “The bonds formed through that shared experience are very strong.”

In 2022, Timbertop students have been given greater choice with the introduction of co-ed hike groups. In the third year of 50:50 gender balance at Timbertop and following the successful transition to co-ed campsites, co-ed hike groups felt like a “natural progression”. “I think it’s been fantastic,” Laura said. “I think it brings out the best in both genders. I think it tempers a bit of the ego and it also helps the nurturing element of the group – there is more compassion and less competition. It’s also been normalised. That’s the beauty of having a different cohort every year – they don’t know any different.”

Student agency is empowering in the outdoors. As students become more experienced, they choose their own hike routes and how much they want to challenge themselves. “There were two girls who wanted to push themselves and we had some boys who wanted to do the hardest hike they could find,” Laura said. “They combined (as a hike group) and as individuals they had challenges – it was a really challenging hike – but they functioned really well as a group. The stereotype is that the boys tend to hike harder, and the girls are better in camp, but one of the girls set the pace and kept the group moving, whilst the boys were really supportive and kept the group together and motivated. It helps to break down some of those gender stereotypes. It doesn’t matter if your gender is male or female or where you sit on the spectrum, it’s about who you are when you show up hiking and if you are willing to challenge yourself, overcome discomfort and help other people.”

Co-ed hike groups are unlikely to be embraced by the majority of Timbertop students, but both Laura and Annabel think they are a positive addition to the Outdoors Programme. “It might only make a difference for a handful of students each year,” Annabel said. “But I think that difference will be significant. Sometimes we see students struggle to find a compatible hike group and now there is more choice for them to pick the people they will hike well with. Having that choice might be the difference between those students hating hiking or loving hiking. It’s also another way to be more inclusive, and not have boys over there and girls over here. This enables students to pick a group of people that they are going to hike well with – not pick a group of girls if you are a girl or pick a group of boys if you are a boy. I just think it’s more progressive and inclusive.”