What happens when a passionate teacher turns to social entrepreneurship to change the narrative about Black children and their relationship with the outdoors? We invite you to discover the inspiring journey of Alex Bailey, the founder of Black Outside Inc., as he uncovers his path from teaching in the Rio Grande Valley to forming an organization that disrupts stereotypes and provides equitable outdoor experiences for Black children.
Far from the typical teacher's tale, Alex shares his grandfather's influence on his life, igniting a love for nature. His experiences in teaching, particularly in schools where the odds seemed stacked against the students, led him to question the conventional methods of education and the limitations they placed on the students. His journey into social entrepreneurship was studded with moments of resilience, learning, and a desire to do more for his community.
We explore Alex's tireless efforts to bridge gaps and create opportunities for Black children to engage, explore, and find liberation in the great outdoors. From challenging stereotypes to fostering healing experiences, Alex's work with Black Outside Inc. opens a new world for Black youth. Tune in as we discuss the transformative power of nature, the importance of equitable access to outdoor activities for black children, and how you can support this cause. Experience the unique insight, inspiring stories, and passion behind the mission as we journey with Alex Bailey.
What happens when a passionate teacher turns to social entrepreneurship to change the narrative about Black children and their relationship with the outdoors? We invite you to discover the inspiring journey of Alex Bailey, the founder of Black Outside Inc., as he uncovers his path from teaching in the Rio Grande Valley to forming an organization that disrupts stereotypes and provides equitable outdoor experiences for Black children.
Far from the typical teacher's tale, Alex shares his grandfather's influence on his life, igniting a love for nature. His experiences in teaching, particularly in schools where the odds seemed stacked against the students, led him to question the conventional methods of education and the limitations they placed on the students. His journey into social entrepreneurship was studded with moments of resilience, learning, and a desire to do more for his community.
We explore Alex's tireless efforts to bridge gaps and create opportunities for Black children to engage, explore, and find liberation in the great outdoors. From challenging stereotypes to fostering healing experiences, Alex's work with Black Outside Inc. opens a new world for Black youth. Tune in as we discuss the transformative power of nature, the importance of equitable access to outdoor activities for black children, and how you can support this cause. Experience the unique insight, inspiring stories, and passion behind the mission as we journey with Alex Bailey.
What's good everyone. I'm Langston Clark, founder and organizer of Entrepreneurial Appetite, a series of events dedicated to building community, promoting intellectualism and supporting black businesses. In this edition of Entrepreneurial Appetite, we bring you a conversation with Alex Bailey, founder of Black Outside Inc. Although Alex has been featured on the show before, this is the first time we have taken a deep dive into the origins of Black Outside and Alex's journey from educator to social entrepreneur. We have our guests here today, alex Bailey joining me. The founder of Black Outside Inc. Tell us a little bit about who you are, how you got started in this. But before that, I want to add that Alex is part of a group of brothers here in San Antonio that's in my community and we get together for lunch every last Friday of the month. We just hang out. There's no agenda, and so, in addition to the work that he does as a social entrepreneur and educated with Black Outside, he's just a good, cool brother to hang around in just a good part of my community here in San Antonio. So, alex, tell us about yourself.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, well, thank you for my introduction. First off. Yeah, a big shout out to you, brother Dr. Clark and brother Langston, that, just for the work you're doing and just like organizing us and getting us together as brothers, it really means a lot. I was actually talking about it last month at a leadership conference for Echoing Green, one of the fellowships I'm in, about the power of healing and growing in community, and so your example of that, and so I think it's so important that we cultivate these communities of healing and learning together as brothers. But yeah, yeah, I was throwing that out there. But yeah, so I'm Alex Bailey.
Alex Bailey :I consider myself an outdoorsman and a broadest sense of the term. I'm the grandchild of a farmer, the Bailey farm in Irwin, North Carolina. Also the grandson of the first black botanical gardener, community garden director in Mansfield, Ohio, and so those two legacies are in me and this deep connection to the land is really in me. And so, educated to, former teacher to teach for America and alum, and currently, in this current chapter of my life and my role, yeah, founder and executive director of Black Outside Inc. So there's definitely more to the journey to share, but I definitely first and foremost see myself as an educator and someone that has a deep connection to the land, both generationally and currently in my life.
Langston :In the past we talked about this that a major influence on your life was your grandfather. Yes, and just talk about how time with your grandfather instilled in you this love of being outside, in the outdoors.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, so my grandfather, john Hood, in Mansfield Ohio. Quick plug Mansfield Ohio, small town. If you've seen Shawshank Redemption, that's only claim to fame in Mansfield Ohio is that it was filmed there. That prison's like I don't know three to four miles away, I think, from my grandparents house. So for my family might be on the call and correct me if I'm wrong, but it's right around, right up the street. But yeah, my grandfather really did cultivate this really deep connection to the land.
Alex Bailey :If you drove to my grandfather's house in the 90s you would pull into this house with this beautiful garden up front of just different flowers, right, and different flowers and roses and all these things up front, this beautiful connection you would see to the land. You will go to the back and my grandfather had a garden of tomatoes and mint tea leaves. He would always grow try to grow grapes for a little bit. Just different squash was a big thing different vegetables and fruits that he would grow in the backyard. So you could just see this like beautiful connection to the earth, right to the earth, and I would help him in the garden during summers.
Alex Bailey :I was really blessed that my mom would drop me off for like two to three weeks and I was like eight, nine years old, hanging out with my grandparents during their late 70s. So it really cultivated this deep elder wisdom in me. But then, on top of that, yeah, just my grandfather would tell me stories about his time working at the garden and how powerful it was. And my grandfather was one of those people that you know, those people that could walk around to like different any tree like this is what it's for.
Alex Bailey :This is how people use it. He's like that he could just identify anything. So it was really fun as a kid, like walking around with them, because I felt like he would just cultivate this curiosity and this wonder of what it means to really know nature and have a deep relationship to nature. So I always say he was the one that really cultivated that and he took me on my first fishing trip behind my grandmother's back. So it's kind of interesting. I had a dichotomous relationship to the outdoors from the sense that my grandmother really didn't, because of some tragedy she experienced, really didn't distance herself from the outdoors and so she was always worried whenever we would go out. But my grandfather took me on a secret fishing trip and always remember that beautiful day on the Clear Fork River and just the stillness of that moment. And those are the moments you know I hopefully try to cultivate with some of our black boys and black youth in our community.
Langston :Yeah, so I'm not from the country, but I think I think what you described is pretty normal. Yeah, like black kids who grew up in the country. Yeah Right, you have some family land, you got a farm, you got some gardening, squash, greens, going fishing all of that's typical, right. But what I know of you was like you go camping. Yeah, like you do this stuff that we, we think like the only white people do right, there are typically only white people do. So how did you go from just fishing with your granddaddy, which is within like a realm of normalcy for most black folk right, to like you actually going outside with a tent and do anything right, so like how did you get to that level of being outside?
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I mean I was really blessed that my stepfather and my mom were married.
Alex Bailey :He actually took us camping a couple times, tent camping, and I was joking now that we were like very bougie tent camping, Like we had a really nice tent I remember and this big, nice blow up mattress and so they I kind of rough it a little bit more but he, you know, he did help cultivate also that that deep connects to the land. But the biggest pivotal shift for me and what the outdoors could be, especially for youth was my time working as a summer camp counselor, my work at all boys camp in the northeast, Camp Onaki, all boys camp, very affluent camp to be open. But I saw the power of the outdoors and I got to learn all these skills there. I went on my first canoe trip, overnight canoe trip, did my first waterfall hike, swam in my first river, mountain river up there. I mean I did all these outdoor recreation activities and I saw the power that they had on youth and it just really reshaped and expanded my perspective of what nature could be, especially in the lives of young people.
Langston :You ever see that show Solucha Shorts? Yes, yes, yes, you had a Solucha Shorts experience.
Alex Bailey :Yes, it was like that, our bug juice. You remember that?
Langston :Yes, it was like that Camp Onawana, yeah, yeah.
Alex Bailey :We pulled you in anyway. Yes, it was like that. We had the chance. We had all that. We drank the bug juice, tons of mosquito bites all summer. Was there black kids there? You know, it's interesting, we had it was a very interesting dynamic because it was a sports camp. It was a six week sports camp. Our counselors about I would say about 20 to 30% were black, Interesting, and so, you know, we had basketball counselors, a lot of African counselors from West Africa that were either soccer or basketball. I coach football and then we had a handful of black boys that attended the camp and it was funny when the parents dropped them off because they would give us a look on the side like, okay, make sure my baby's all right. I was like you know we got it.
Alex Bailey :We got a little jamal, we got a lot of different things. Good, so yeah.
Langston :I want to ask this question because you brought up sports. You brought up, you coached football. So you have the interesting transitions in your life from from team sports to teaching, to social entrepreneurship. So, yeah, like, give us your story, like you're in college now, or you, you were a high school athlete. Yeah, you were all state and Ohio. You were in a top recruited, tight end prospects. Oh man, you turned down Ohio State but you decided to go. No, so much.
Alex Bailey :I can't, I can't catch on. This was not what happened.
Langston :Well, just talk about what it meant for you to go from, from athletics college, college student athlete, to teaching and social entrepreneurship.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I mean, you know it might sound cliche you hear a lot of student athletes say this but I mean you just learned so much about the concept of team and how important that is and when to step up as a leader, when to step back, and I think especially playing football teaches you that. So as background, I now play at Ohio State. I wish I did, but I played at a small school high Wesleyan, go-bishop and really had a great, solid experience playing there. I mean, we weren't the best team, but some of those football friendships still last to this day and I think it was kind of powerful that we weren't like super successful on the team. You know we got a behind skates, a lot of games and we had to get back up and figure it out.
Alex Bailey :I didn't really get playing time until my junior, until my senior year, you know, and so I really had to cultivate this, this journey and this process. And I think football and athletics sometimes really can teach you that sometimes it's a marathon, not a sprint. Right, you got to think about the big picture. You're playing a team game season or basketball. You're playing 30 plus games. You lose one game, it's okay. And similarly, you know, I think about that transition to teaching. Right, I'm like, okay, I had one rough lesson playing when I was a teacher. Okay, there's another day I can get back up, try it again Now, as a social entrepreneur, didn't get a grant.
Alex Bailey :Okay, keep your head down, try the next thing. So I feel like it really, instead of just giving up pretty easily, man, it just cultivates this like really resilient spirit in you and you know, get knocked down on your behind a few times in football will really teach you that it's like you're gonna get up or you're gonna put your pads away. You make your choice right. And so I think it was a really great opportunity for me and many of those life lessons, those friendships, but those life lessons that just like riding back home on a bus, we just got a behind kicks lost by 40. And it's like, okay, so what are we gonna do next? We gonna try to pivot our strategy, or am I gonna work harder? Am I gonna do something new? And I think that's another piece. I really learned that I applied very much to the classroom. It was a great transition for me. I'll name one other quick thing. For me, it was interesting. I left college, though, and I didn't want to look at a football for like two months.
Alex Bailey :So it burns out for me. And that's when, honestly, I started exploring the outdoors a little bit more on my own because I just I still wanted to be active so I would go on nature runs in South Texas, started hiking a little bit later, just finding different ways to be active Because you know, at some point you got to put the pads away and find different ways to explore your body. So why teach it Was?
Langston :education a major in college. It was Really I didn't know that.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, education was my major, yeah, yeah so it was my major, Education was my major, so all ties to my grandfather. My grandfather was a World War II veteran. He had wild stories. He was a World War II veteran, a Black Navy frogman, so basically they were like the Navy special operations before the SEALs. So you can Google, you know who the frogmen were Black Navy frogmen stationed in the Philippines. I mean, he just had wild stories about like the racism they experienced, a World War II Also, just like the experience of being stationed in the Philippines, 100 degree days, profusely sweating, just so many different things that he experienced. So he told me these very vivid stories and I'll talk about that.
Alex Bailey :He loved history Every day. He would like he would come in and he would come in and give me newspaper articles. He's like did you know? A Black person created this. He was one of them, granddad, yeah, yeah. And so it was weird. One day I was sitting in my AP World History class and I remember him saying to me I told him I was like I think I want to be a history teacher one day. I want to tell the stories that you told me one day when you're not here. So I was able to do that, so that's why I ended up choosing Ohio Wesley, and they had an awesome teacher preparation program. On top of that I could play football, so it was very much in line aligned to what I wanted to do.
Langston :Okay, this is interesting because I always thought that teach for America was biased.
Alex Bailey :I don't know TFA like that. Oh man, you can accept what you want.
Langston :Yeah, I always thought TFA was biased against people who were already teaching majors, because they were looking for people who weren't already in that pathway. Yeah, so how did you get to do TFA and have that experience and all of that?
Alex Bailey :Yeah. So a couple of things happened before my blackoutside journey won. I knew about my sophomore year. I just made a decision that I wanted to teach youth of color and I wanted that. I never. One of the reasons I wanted I became a teacher was because I never had a black male teacher. I never had not one black male teacher in my whole K through 12 experience. I was really blessed. Shout out to Jason Burke, coach Topey from high school. I mean he was one of the few black male coaches we had. Really amazing. He was a fifth grade teacher. He let me shadow him for a day and I remember I was 16, 17,. Just seeing him in the classroom in Iraq and just seeing the few black students he had, how they reacted to him, yeah, he was very much a paternal figure for me.
Alex Bailey :So I shared it to say I wanted to be that, you know, hopefully for a young, especially young black boy, and so there's an irony in me saying that I'll come back to in a second. But so I got into my student teaching. I actually requested I was one of the only people that requested in my student teaching opportunity to teach in Columbus City schools in Ohio. Everyone else kind of taught at more suburban districts. I taught at Columbus City Schools. I said put me, I want to be down there with youth of color and even then, being 21 student teaching, I already saw those relationships being built, especially with some of the black boys in my class Then looking up to me when I finished. They're like man, you were like a big brother to me here in class and just having someone who is in college kind of a little bit more approximate to their age, was really powerful.
Alex Bailey :So where TFA came in is 100% real. Here's the real truth to what happened. I'm student teaching, everything's going good. Yeah, I started to get this gut feeling like I was ready to get out of the Midwest. It feels very monotonous. Yeah, you feel me. Yeah, so, yeah, the system principle. I met with him. I was having a check in as a student teacher and he's like man, you're doing a great job. He's like man, I'd love to hire you right now, on the spot. And I was like, okay, this might be my first job offer.
Alex Bailey :He tells me looks in the eyes like but you would have to substitute here in our district for two years. And I am going to be real. I was just like you know as far as my young ego. I was just like man. I literally got to observe other teachers at the school and, honestly, like I saw some of them just teaching up the textbook, some of them not even trying to be creative with lesson plans, and I was like I can teach more creative lessons already than some of these folks. I deserve to like have a chance. You know, it's kind of like sports. I'm like I'm ready to be on the field coach. So when that conversation happened happened to just hear about Teach for America by happenstance someone had told me that recruiter was on campus and I signed up for like one of the very last spots.
Langston :And I was just like man.
Alex Bailey :I'm not even applying for this program. I don't need this and I'll never forget it was. It was a white woman. She looked me dead in the eye and she goes at the end of our conversation. We're having coffee. I'm kind of like whatever I can get a teaching job, I don't need TFA. She looked me dead in the eye. She says you know, I just want to let you know, I taught in Compton. I did TFA in LA. I was a white woman. My I would wish my kids had a teacher like you and after that they got me.
Langston :I was like okay, time me up so fast word.
Alex Bailey :I talked about the irony real quick. The irony of me saying about teaching black kids especially, was I signed up for TFA and the way TFA used to work back in the days. They would give you 12 regions, right, you would pick 12 regions and they'll pick one. So I'm picking. I'm like, okay, you know what I want to get out of the Midwest if I get accepted. So I was like I put Atlanta, I put Houston, I put Dallas, I put the Bay Area, I put LA and I started to run out of places. So I'm like, man, you know, I put San Antonio, quentin only.
Alex Bailey :And then I was, san Antonio was no, I had never been to Texas, brother, I had never even stepped foot in Texas. I was ready to leave the Midwest and try something new, and my grandparents really cultivated that.
Alex Bailey :I mean they're like wow see the world, which I really appreciate. And I started to run out and finally at the end I saw this like region. It's a real Grande Valley, Texas. I never heard of it, Didn't know what it was. I was like I'll throw that on there. But here I am thinking, young black kid, young black male, already certified to teach, Like they're gonna throw me in Dallas, they're gonna throw me one of the places. Sure enough, I get the real Grande Valley, South Texas. And the irony of this is when I taught, I ended up only teaching about three black kids while I was down for three years. But love my experience. It was really really powerful.
Alex Bailey :Yeah.
Langston :So we talked about TFA, yeah, and I think about Teach for America has social social entrepreneurship roots, oh, yes. And did that TFA experience give you an outlook on social social entrepreneurship as you transition into black outside? But before you delve into that, or as you delve into that, talk about what your transition out of K through 12 was like. What prompted that move?
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I mean, you know, honestly, I just got tired of teaching to a test. I taught Star Tested, which is our standardized testing in Texas. I taught that and subject again history yeah so I taught world geography.
Alex Bailey :I taught AP World History, which was one of the more fun years, was a little bit more of a freeing curriculum, yeah. But yeah, to just be direct into where we I ended up, it was my fourth year teaching. I was teaching in the district outside of Austin and I got moved in the middle of the year to teach US history and the kids I mean just for educators, just gonna throw out some numbers. The kids were projected. They took a mock state test and they were projected that only 8% of them were going to pass. So basically that teacher resigned in the middle of the year. Of course they're like let's get the black teacher in here, the things you know that goes to the school. So they moved me. They moved me in in December.
Alex Bailey :I have three months to get these kids all caught up. This is their juniors. Like they have to pass this test and I had this decision to make. I had a real talk with them. Like, look, y'all are juniors, I know you have to pass this test. And they're like. And they asked me I will never forget that like, so you're just gonna teach you the test all year. And I was like do y'all want me to and they're like not really. So I was like okay, we won't. So I taught whatever I wanted for two and a half months.
Alex Bailey :I taught social justice topics. I mean we kind of aligned it to things that we on the test. So social justice had a whole black history unit, had a whole Chicano rights movement, I mean women's history. We did an old thing, debates like Socratic circles, project based learning, we're doing all that. And then three weeks before the test, I reread the test, made a packet and I was like, okay, I promise you, if you guys like finish this packet, we'll. Just, we just did road memorization. And we did road memorization. 98% of the kids passed. And I just had this revelation. I was like this to me I mean, I'm just gonna be directed to say this in a crash. I mean it just felt so asinine you know, like the whole process.
Alex Bailey :I was like I literally in three weeks, got these kids prepared for a state test and that was the thing that pushed me out in the classroom. I was like the whole system to me is just the way we like. Prioritize standardized testing, especially in Texas, isn't right, you know.
Langston :I listened to a podcast from Seth Golden yesterday and he was like it doesn't make sense to teach memorization or have multiple choice when you can just Google the answer. It's not preparing, it makes no sense. Yeah, to teach to a test If you don't have the answer, you just go Google it. Yeah, you can find it anyway, precisely. So what's the point of having the kids just memorize it and they're not going to retain it, they just go Google it when they forget it, precisely.
Alex Bailey :Precisely so yeah, you asked about social entrepreneurs. Well, before we go, before we go, there.
Langston :It's interesting that your story is about not wanting to teach to the test. But I hear all of these other conversations about why brothers leave, and some of it is. It's like they just want me to be the discipline area, and if this lady doesn't know how to deal with this black boy, this black girl, they always bring it to me and then I have to fix what is a problem to her but isn't a problem to me. And now you're not doing your job, you're putting your job on me. Or we talk about brothers being aspirational and wanting to move into leadership positions, but you get pigeonholed as dean of students because they view you only as a disciplinary. You're viewed only as the disciplining black father, but not for your intellectual capabilities, your pedagogical capabilities. Was that any part of your experience in teaching? I know you kind of mentioned that this other teacher did a bad job and they put you with this class. That would fail. But what other instances might have been there like that?
Alex Bailey :Yeah, definitely would love to speak into that. So I definitely felt some of that for sure, especially in my last school district. I didn't feel it as much in the valley just because, like, I only had like three black kids and so I mean the three black kids I were really tight and you know they would hang out in my room and I'll never forget exposing one to what HBCUs were and he actually ended up going to Texas Southern.
Alex Bailey :Later I found out down the road and so really great young man. But yeah, when I was in my district in Austin, I started experiencing some of that because I heard other brothers in TFA tell me about those experiences and I started seeing it. I think the difference with me was and I think there's an article about this the characterizations are buckets that they put black male teachers. There's like the disciplinarian, the sports coach, and there's like the silly, comical Will Smith type of teacher. So I was caught in that one that they knew I was like you know, they come to my classroom, man, I'm cracking jokes, we're having fun and so. But as a year progressed slowly, they're like can you have this senior sit in your room?
Langston :And I'm like I don't even know this kid like why are you at the?
Alex Bailey :Star of Basketball play center. So I'm talking to him like what's going?
Langston :on. I don't know. I was like well, I don't know why you're in here, so anyway, back to my lesson.
Alex Bailey :Like I, was like what you want me to do about this situation, you know. But on top of that, other unique layer in terms of my transition was which I don't know if I shared this with you how I was supposed to go to the University of Texas for principal program. Oh, you did. I thought about the top line. Yeah, I got accepted into the University of Texas's principal program. I so I hit that wall.
Alex Bailey :My fourth year I'm like I'm done with the teaching thing. You know what? Let me move up with a lot of brothers, let me move up in a more admin role and think more expansively and visionary for what it could be. And so, as part of my role, I started shadowing. They gave me opportunity to shadow and assist the principal and literally I remember spending like literally the last period of the day just writing up referrals for kids and I was like, oh no, this is not it, like this is not it. You got busy work, yeah, busy work, yeah, busy work, and it just really drove me out of like what education could be. And, coincidentally, at the same time I got to offer the leadership coach and teacher America. And so I got accepted to UT, got this offer to leadership coach and TFA. So I was like you know what, let me defer UT for a year, do the leadership coaching and TFA. This will brought me to San Antonio and when I took that path, man, I never looked back. I never did, you know. You know, so what's prompts black outside? Okay, I'm being super open. There are a few moments that kind of built up to it, but there's, honestly, one pivotal moment. I always remember my summer camp experience. Right, I always remember my summer camp experience and I always remember how much joy I had and like I experienced like moments of joy, for sure, in the classroom and definitely tons of moments of happiness. I mean, I love my students to death. They still stay with me to this day. Someone follow me on Instagram and social media, feel them taking me out there now, 22, 23, they're taking me out for drinks. So it's like really cool to watch them grow and evolve into, like these, adults and leaders in their communities.
Alex Bailey :But yeah, going back to that, I was in TFA, I was in the end of my first year and it's gonna be radically open. What happened, man? I was a second semester coaching and I was like, okay, I like this job, it's cool, it's different. I definitely like it more in the classroom, but I knew it wasn't my forever job. It felt like a transitional job and I'm sitting in this budget meeting and TFA is a nonprofit, so I'm allowed to say this. I look up and we're in this budget meeting. I didn't know how much the budget was. You know, I'm a naive person, a young kid that just got out of teaching, and I'll look up and I'll never forget. I looked up and I'm like, yeah, so the budget for this year is like 2.8 million. And I was like, wait, what it's like 2.8 million?
Alex Bailey :And this thought came on my head of like Two thoughts can concurrently came. One, I was like, hey, and for a fraction of that cost I could probably do a summer camp, like that happened. But then, two, I just had this really deep, almost like spiritual reflective moment to be open with your brother, where I asked myself and I felt like honestly it was almost the universe asking me like when did you find the most happiness? And I remember asking. I was like saying like, oh, yeah, it was at camp. And just I honestly really felt the universe being like why don't you do that now for kids that look like you? And I was like, why am I not doing that now? And I just had this.
Alex Bailey :Paula Quello talks about this in the alchemist of some of his other books that he believes that like humans have like three to four big epiphanies in their life. And this was like one of my big epiphanies, where I was why am I not choosing joy and happiness and what I do? And that just really propelled me. This is at the end of my first year leadership coaching and I had space and capacity on the side to just explore this world of what it would be like to like start a summer camp for black kids. And it sent me on this two year journey where I ended up shadowing over 14 summer camps and outdoor organizations across the country.
Langston :Wait, you put yourself through a program, or you found a program that puts you through that.
Alex Bailey :I did it myself. Wow, I reached out on the side. I would just email these summer camps and like hey, can I come in? I went to three in New York, I went to my former camp that I worked at, to one or two in California, went to four in Texas. I would just email random programs and just say tell me everything and then if they let me in the program which is really great and it's so like great, today, I don't know, just like me randomly emailing these programs like, hey, I'm so and so Can I just come in and shadow people?
Alex Bailey :Like sure, come on in. And I'm really grateful those people and they would let me shadow the camps and I would talk to kids. What are you getting most out of this experience and the power of that experience? What it realizes is it opened me up to this greater outdoor recreational world Because I realized that summer camp to me summer camp is one of the most transformative models for getting kids really connected to nature. And also, you know, I got to interview a program out of Houston, the Woods Project. They're really, really awesome and they take kids from Third Ward, houston, and take them backpacking in Glacier National Park. Yeah, powerful stuff. So I got to meet with their member of their team and I was like whoa, this is a whole expansive universe. It felt like the opening of a Marvel universe that I got exposed to.
Langston :OK, yeah, so I was just about to ask you how did you get parents of hood kids in San Antonio to get their kids to go camping with you? Yeah, real camping, yeah, but when you talked about Third Ward Houston, there was a model for that already in place, but what did that look like for you here in San Antonio?
Alex Bailey :Yeah, so that's the timeline transitions forward. Been about a year and a half doing that. Have this big epiphany on this hike in the Cascale Mountains in New York by myself, and when I was shadowing camps I had a day, kind of a buffer day in between. I go on this nine mile hike. I get to this point where, like everyone's taking all their IG pictures, it's like 20 people and I look around, I'm the only black person in this park. Yeah, why is that? And so and I remember writing down saying like I think we just got to get more black kids back outside. And then I wrote down kind of in bullet points black outside. And then I just put comma ink and I still have that notebook to this day.
Alex Bailey :Wow, I wrote in the Cascale Mountains and it hiked out four miles and I was just playing in my head what this program could look like. And so when I got back on the ground I really started chilling the ground. Thankfully, I was already mentoring with a hundred black men, and so when it up happening is, I pitched to some of the other brothers and mentors like what it would be like to take five of our black boys camping and just see how they respond to an environment that's totally different. Outside the city, we had already done some local mentoring activities. Let's try something totally new. And so the spring of 2019, after kind of putting in the 501c3 paperwork for black outside, we took five black boys on their first camping trip and I think a lot of it to answer your question directly was trust capital, brother, like we just have into this day.
Alex Bailey :I think that's a huge strength of our program. We have a huge trust capital with a lot of our families that they're like hey, next week we're literally taking kids next week to Colorado to backpack in the Rockies and they're just like, ok, like we trust you all, and I think part of it is them seeing someone that looks like them, yeah, doing these things and modeling it, and part of it is just we just I feel like our families know we're really genuine. We want to know them. As a kid, I don't want them to just be a number in our program. We want them to know them, their families, their families have my number, they text me, they give me updates. You know I get to go to graduation parties, graduation celebrations. We really have this holistic care for our kids. That I think is really powerful and sometimes sets us apart from some other program, especially some that aren't BIPOC led.
Langston :Yeah, hey, everyone. Thank you again for your support of entrepreneurial appetite. Beginning this season, we are inviting our listeners to support the show through our Patreon website. The founding 55 patrons will get live access to our monthly discussions for only $5 a month. Your support will help us hire an intern or freelancer to help with the production of the show. Of course, you can also support us by giving us five stars, leaving a positive comment or sharing the show with a few friends. Thank you for your continued support. Talk about the mission. Just stay for us. The mission outside.
Alex Bailey :Yeah. So our mission for Black Outside, we are very intentional about every single word of that mission statement. The first word is that we seek to reconnect Black youth to the outdoors. So when we say reconnect, we're very intentional about that word RE or that part RE, because Black folks have had a prominent history in nature and I think too many times, even in other outdoor programs and I'll name it and be critical of that other outdoor programs they see our kids as these empty vessels, like they've never touched nature before.
Alex Bailey :And yes, a kid may not have been to a state park our backpack but dang it, man. You go to the East Side, man, see kids riding bikes everywhere. You go to MLK Park on a Sunday, you'll see people out there barbecuing. So I think a lot of times our connection to nature isn't honored in the wider outdoor industry. So our mission is to reconnect Black and African-American youth to the outdoors and it's just that simple and we do that in very expansive ways, everything from summer camp to we've kayaked, we've done climbing, we've taken Black kids skiing, backpacking, gardening, community gardening, yoga in a park. But yeah, we're hoping to man. We just did our first mountain biking partnership. We're hoping to expand the biking next. I mean, if it's an outdoor activity, we really try to find ways to bring our youth in to do it and it's really awesome that our youth really love to explore these new ways of connecting to the outdoors.
Langston :So, for those of you in the audience, this is not the first time Alex and I have done a podcast recording. This is the first time we've done one one on one where he's been the focal point. Yeah, and so I think it's one of our previous conversations. First, let me let me, let me just quickly give you a rundown of those previous conversations. I think it's important that you all check those out, not bragging on my podcast, but it is great, it's a great podcast, oh you didn't brag right, so I actually have an appetite.
Langston :Has two, two previous episodes with Alex. One was with Dr Carolyn Finney and we talked about her book Black Faces in White Spaces, I think that's the name of it. And then we had a dope conversation with Phil Henderson and some other Black Black men who do work in the outdoors justice working the outdoors and Phil led the first group of Black folks to climb Mount Everest, and so I think in the past there had been Black people who had climbed Mount Everest. He's the first one, I think, who was the descendant of American slaves to do so. But across the board, in terms of Black folks, he's the first one to lead an all Black teen Mount Everest, and what was interesting about that is that it's intergenerational. It's very intentional about taking younger folks up there with him, which parallels what Alex does.
Langston :And so in one of those conversations I brought up this urbanization of Black folks, and so anytime, and you notice, being an urban, education urban, because that's a cold word for Black, but it makes it seem like all we are is in cities. Yeah, the reality is is like we're country folk and I think sometimes we internalize being in the city as you being sharper, you being more, you being cooler, more valuable in the Black culture. But the reality is we are all in our roots in nature and so can you talk a little bit about how maybe this urbanization of Black folks and I don't know if that comes from us Like if that trope of urban, black being equal to urban is something that comes from Black culture? How does that play into how we stereotype or limit what we think Black children already have in terms of their relationship to the outdoors?
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I mean, we see it play out in schools all the time, unfortunately. I mean, I think about the careers that our schools are, our kids, especially in urban communities, and are exposed to. It's rare that they're told about green jobs. It's rare that they're exposed to. I mean even just the fact that when we took Black college students skiing, we were very intentional about partnering with the Taoski Resort. It was awesome. They're B Corporation, so they give back. They flew us all out, the whole team of first. It was the first all Black group, it was a all first time scheme, and so they go there.
Alex Bailey :And it just was this realization even from one student. She was an accounting major at Trinity University here locally, and she's like it didn't even hit me that as an accounting major, everyone had just pushed her to work for the big business, work for Goldman Sachs, work for these big companies, and she's like I don't even think. Yeah, these ski resorts, north Face, nike, all these big outdoor companies also need accountants, right? So that's what I mean. So kind of back to the urban pieces. A lot of times I think, in terms of the career development side, a lot of our kids get pushed into these careers that also mash this like urban piece. I think here in San Antonio the name it it's sports, it's military. I think here in San Antonio it's cybersecurity, not that it's bad.
Alex Bailey :Cybersecurity is really great, right, but not every kid wants to do that, right, and so we got to really think expansively. So I think that's one way that that happens. And then I think, broadly speaking, the other pieces of the way our parks are set up right and like play, into that too. I mean I'll name openly, and I've said this to the parks here and I know it's a very critical piece and I'll just share. It's like you know, dog parks in our black neighborhoods look radically different than our parks in the suburbs. Yeah Right, and the way even to access the recreational activity.
Langston :Wait, you know what I thought you said. I thought you said dog parks. Well, that too you know what. I'm saying it's interesting. Right, you'll go to a more affluent posh part of town and they'll have a nice part for their dogs Nicer than some of our parks and neighborhoods.
Alex Bailey :Some of the dog parks and suburban neighborhoods even San Antonio are nicer than some of the parks that we have in some of our communities, and so that's what breaks my heart. So I think it plays also into this. I shared this with someone once who was connected to the city, but we just got to get more people connected to the parks and I'm like, well, have you been to X Park lately? I mean, when I go there, it looks way different than when I go to parks on the north side of town which are more a more fluid area. I was like when I go there, it's like, yeah, I love nature, I don't want to spend that much time there Because, like I was, like I just it doesn't even look like it's well kept, that there's deep care.
Alex Bailey :I go up there, the paths are really clean, the trails really clean, there's, yeah, just less park police like roaming around asking you what you're doing. I never get asked anything. I can just hike there with a lot of freedom and feel liberated, and I feel like some of those are green spaces and urban areas play into that also, of this feeling of like, oh you, you as a black kid, you're part of this urban thing. You are in the house or you play basketball, or you play sports Like why would you be at a park? You always be at a park is to play basketball, right. What if a kid wants to go to the park to look at some leaves or explore nature? I grow a garden, right. Why not that? So yeah, and basketball is outside.
Langston :Yes, you know what I mean.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, yeah, so it's like I love what Dr Caroline Finney said. I think for us, I want. I love what she said and it's so relevant today. She's like I want our black kids to play in the sand, but I don't want them to play in a sandbox, I want them to play at a beach. Yeah, and that's similar to that, like the reality about urbanization. I think a lot of times they, our kids are putting these boxes in reality. It's like, yes, basketball is great. I grew up playing basketball in parks outside right but why does it just have to be that? Why can't it be all these other opportunities? Yeah, for sure.
Langston :Talk about within black. Outside, to the initiatives that I'm familiar with camp founder girls and then brothers with the land, yeah, yeah, so big shout out to camp founder girls.
Alex Bailey :I got to promote our documentary that just came out on BET called Founder Girls. It's actually America's first first historically black summer camp for girls. It started here in our home city in San Antonio, in 1924. In the midst of me getting ready to take those five boys out in the spring of 2019, I got wind of this, this story about this black summer camp that existed in San Antonio, and I started cross-tracking the history and I was like I think this is the first camp for black girls in the whole country and it started here in San Antonio.
Alex Bailey :So we heard about it, met with our board, met with our volunteer team at the time and I was like what would it look like to revive this camp? And, sure enough, yeah, we ended up reviving it. 2019 was our first summer. 35 girls in this past summer. If we include our counselors in training or high school students, we served over 185 girls this past summer.
Langston :And where would they? Would they just from San Antonio, or yeah?
Alex Bailey :about 50% more or less come from San Antonio, but we got we have kids represented from 12 different states. Yeah, yeah, it's pretty wild. So, yeah, we have flying campers that come from all over Dallas, houston, austin, also, I mean Arizona, new York. We have a whole group of kids that came from my Florida this year. It's really powerful. I can't, because if you walk into camp you don't you forget that there's kids from all over. There's just this and I'm wondering if this is very similar to HBCU experience. Like you just walk in, you're like there's so much connected of this around black joy in the space that and I'm sure behind the scenes are definitely like class differences that you feel, but you really don't feel it, compared to like other camps I've been in.
Langston :I was going to say that because we think about things made specifically for black people that are stereotypically for white people, and it's always it seems, as if it's this black, black upper class organization that gets access to the camping or the ski or whatever. But what you're doing is interesting and unique. Counter to that stereotype about black elite only getting access to these opportunities is that is really multi. What's the word Multi-classal Like transcends class, and so I think that that is something that's very interesting and unique about what you do.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I appreciate that and that's one of our visions. I mean we, one of our statements is that we believe every kid deserves access to the outdoors and there should be zero barriers to them experiencing any activity. So with that, yeah, our summer camp is on a sliding scale. Families pay as much as they're able to. We commit to covering the rest through fundraising. So the full cost of camp is about more or less, almost around $500. Yeah, close to that. And then so we have some families that pay the full amount and more for other kids to come. We have some that only can only pay $20.
Alex Bailey :Right, so there's a huge class diversity within our camp and it's really powerful. And across our programs when we get kids that you know I have to pick them up. I mean Sunday morning, when we get ready to go to Colorado, there'll be some kids out to pick up, right, and like, pick them up from the house and do all that. And they're great young people. And I have other folks that you know. The past years we've had folks or their families work for Southwest. They're like I'll just fly my kid there, right, and you know I live in Houston, I can fly him over, you know. So we there's a lot of class difference and I think it's really powerful because in our programs I mean, there's little things that kids will pick up.
Alex Bailey :They're like oh, you want to be from a different part of town, but man, it's one of the few spaces where I feel like it really does start to transcend class, especially when you go into these deep wilderness spaces.
Langston :Man talk about Brothers with the Land.
Alex Bailey :Absolutely so. This is our newest program, brothers with the Land, and the purpose of Brothers with the Land is to provide high school black boys experiences in mentorship, leadership, development and healing spaces, and so we do this all through nature based activities. This year, we did a lot of fun stuff with our cohort of boys about 10 to 12 boys alongside all an all black male mentorship team and volunteer team. I went to camping trips this year and they had a blast at state parks. We did some community gardening, we hosted a yoga event for black men in our community and we also went fly fishing this year. And so, man, it was powerful to watch those black boys really connect and, as the year went on, watch their walls come down. Because one difference at least alongside of traditional genders, we have our girls in our program. They're like a lot more curious about the outdoors. They're really open. If I, for our girls program, I'm like, hey, we're going climbing tomorrow, y'all ready to climb? They're like Cool, give me the honors, let's do it, man.
Alex Bailey :A lot of our boys, unfortunately, they've been socialized into this place of being scared, of showing fear, right. So if it's like if we come up to a climbing wall, they're like, oh, I don't want to do that, I ain't doing that. And I'm like, okay, are you scared? No, I'm scared, I just don't want to do it. I'm like you know, I'm like you scared. That's okay to be scared. So nature teaches you so much about vulnerability, right, because you're just never going to know everything. And so I think what's really beautiful about these spaces is to really watch a lot of our boys really open up over time, really connect with one another, cultivate the space of brotherhood. We went on a big deep night hike in our last camping trip and it was wild to just watch the kids. Just give me the headlamp, let's do it.
Alex Bailey :I think, if I had done that, the first part of the year they would be like Heck, no, I'm gonna walk through the woods at night. And they did it on their own. We kind of had checkmarks and we practiced it with them. So it's really powerful to watch again their walls come down in the world to really open up.
Langston :I think it's interesting. What you're doing is transcends class, but from what I've seen, it also transcends age, right, and so you have grown men who volunteer to participate in helping out with the boys. You have grown women helping out with the girls. I wonder if you can talk about the experiences that you've curated for the adult men, right, yeah, talk about the yoga experience and what you saw, how you saw brothers opening, and this wasn't an outdoor experience, it was a healing space that was created. But talk about that work that you've been doing. Yeah, for the parallel adjacent.
Alex Bailey :Absolutely so. It's one realization. I'll kind of start with creation of black outside. What sets us apart, I think, from other outdoor organizations, and this isn't a knock against them. I think about one difference that some folks have noticed I don't care that much about. If you're going to volunteer with us, I don't care how much outdoor experience you have. I really don't. We can teach that stuff.
Langston :I mean it's helpful.
Alex Bailey :I care that you like enjoy nature, but I care most about your passion for kids, especially kids that look like us, Because I've told some volunteers I was like the outdoor stuff we can teach you. Setting up a tent is not rocket science, I think too many times in the outdoor industry, as an aside, there's these gate like. There's so much gatekeeping, Like you have to go through this tent keeping class or how to pack a backpack to hike, and it's like hiking 101, hiking 201, hiking 301. I'm like it's a city part Just hike, just walk around. We've been doing this.
Langston :Yeah.
Alex Bailey :You know and you just learn as you go, Just like I kind of teach myself some things. So I think that's the beauty of our program. And so what's been happening is we've gotten more volunteers. They come in and they're like hey, I'm a passion for kids. This is something different. Let's do the work. And then I'm like, okay, cool, well, we're going to go fly fishing. Have you been before? Like no, I was like All right, where are you going to go? Here's some waders, here's some boots. Let's learn this together. And I started watching the black men in our program really open up. They're like man, this is fun I mean, that's as much or even more fun than the kids sometimes right, and they're adventuring. They're like hey, let's go explore on this hike, let's do these things. I saw the healing of their inner black boy come out.
Langston :Wow, say that again. Yeah, I saw that again, alex. Yeah, I saw. You need to say that into that camera and then you need to say it into that camera.
Alex Bailey :I'll say I saw the healing of their inner black boy come out and so it was so powerful to watch this black boy joy get cultivated in a lot of our black men. Yeah, and I was like we got to figure out more spaces for this. So this spring we hosted our first yoga event. It was an intentional black male healing event. It was powerful to watch 20 black brothers come out. It was a paid event, so it was powerful that that money went back to black boys in our program. A couple of our black boys came help lead and volunteer that space. It was so beautiful to just see us build that community. So that's something we really want to expand to is cultivate these spaces for black men in conjunction alongside our brothers with the land program. So, yeah, this next year I'll go ahead and name where we have some stuff up the pipeline around. We're hoping to do a day with a partner summer camp facility potentially. You know, I'm just going to say it out loud on the podcast, I'm gonna say it, you heard it here first, I heard it here first.
Alex Bailey :I'm working to try to get a trip to Big Bend for black men. Okay, I think we'll be powerful. I want to get you involved in that. No, you're busy. But black big business, y'all know is is the darkest sky area in the lower 48. So like you can see the stars. The stars are the most clear in Big Bend out of almost any place in the lower 48 States in America. It's our biggest national park in Texas. It is five hours away. It's kind of a place you got to really earn to get to. But when you get out there I mean it's just such a magical place and many of our black men have never even heard of this beautiful place A lot of outdoor folks go to. So I'm working behind the scenes to get a space like that for black men because I think it's powerful that if we cultivate these beautiful spaces for our black men, imagine the power and healing that they can cultivate for our black boys even if they're not even volunteering with us for black boys in their community and in their families, all right.
Langston :You got camp, found girls, brothers with the land. I want you to talk about your big vision for land. Yeah, talk about that and talk about why that's necessary for what you're trying to do, if you're trying to scale black outside.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, I mean, I've named it to some of our awesome funders and partners on a fun and call today and I just spoke, I believe, in speaking things into existence right. And so you know, for us, our summer camp fills up within 96 hours. We don't have to recruit for a summer camp. Yeah, if you talk to a lot of summer camps some, well, a heavy amount they're like I recruit all year to get our kids filled. We don't have that issue. We fill up like that and so we always joke that our demand is higher than our supply. I would love to serve more kids. The issue here in Texas is over 97% of our land is private. Our hands are tied with how much we're able to serve because we literally don't share, have access, equitable access to these land spaces. So you know, to be open, I've hit some walls and I think the wall I hit we got a little bit of frustration is we get a lot of summer camps to reach out to us. They're like oh this is great.
Alex Bailey :We're looking for more diversity in our camps. I'm like okay, and they're like okay, well, send your kids to our camp. No, the reason why some parents send their kids to our camp is not necessarily your kids bad. They want their kid to feel safe. Are you recruiting black counselors at your camp? Are you intentional about equity inclusion? Are you? When our black kids come into our camp, they get handed black girl sunscreen, like? We're very intentional about centering the black experiences. So our families are intentional about sending them to us because they'll send them to other camps too, but they love the experience of it.
Alex Bailey :It feels like almost like an HBCU in the outdoors. So I'll have to say this all ties to land, because I've realized I'm like it's so important for us to play a role also in stewarding land right, modeling that and being able to impact a greater population of black youth throughout the year by having land space. So we really believe I mean we could probably quadruple even or even more our impact by having a land space. That's the next big thing black outside. I think we want to do is have our own land space and I think it's so important that I think black folks own our steward less than 0.5% of the land in Texas.
Alex Bailey :If we really believe that our earth is changing right and climate change is happening and that we got to protect our earth, black folks have to have a seat at the table in those discussions. A part of that seat at the table has to be that we have to have the ability to also steward land spaces too, and so I think that's a discussion I've had with some even prominent white landowners. Y'all got to start making some space Collectively. Y'all own so much land here, especially in Texas. What role do we play in that? And so you know we want to see that table. We also believe in building our own tables where our kids and our communities can also feel safe too.
Langston :Alex, talk about the other documentary that you're going to be featured in and have some hand in.
Alex Bailey :Absolutely. And before I jump into that we do. I just want to name. We do have a third program that we do offer, a Koei program, our multi-gender program called the Bloom Project. So that's for youth impacted by incarceration and they're the ones that have actually done the most diversity of activities. Love that school-holder kids are really sacred to my heart. They do a lot of healing work and I want to shout out, yeah, just amazing work of that whole program team, of what they do. But yeah, our brothers with the land is our newest program, camp Founder Girls, our largest program, bloom, is kind of a program in between and there's some youth that actually cross programs. So I do want to shout that out. And yeah, so I'm also part of an awesome documentary and team of brothers called Black Water. Seen Black Waters.
Alex Bailey :Last summer we became, we believe, as far as the record show, we were the first all black fly fishing team to fly fish in the Arctic Circle. So we did that last summer. We went on about five day expedition in the Arctic Circle. Apparently, according to the map, if we had kept flying our bush plane about 75 more minutes, we would have probably hit the North Pole. That's how far north we were. I didn't know, you were all the way. Yeah, we were up there. We were up there. I mean they're basically where we were at. There was like a three to four week window where you can camp.
Alex Bailey :After that snow hits again. Wow, yeah, it was wild. So, like the high, it was beautiful. I mean the high was about high fifties, but at night it got down there to about, you know, in the thirties. And this is the middle of July and on top of that, our last night, that's when we had our first like windstorm come through, it was like 30 degrees and raining. We almost didn't think we could fly out. So it was a really powerful experience just doing that with an all black team. But yeah, the documentary Black Waters focuses on exploring black masculinity and we're doing that all through the lens or through the experience of fly fishing in the Arctic Circle. So the documentary is going to premiere in Portland in August and then we're going on a film tour that includes Atlanta, portland, atlanta, madison, wisconsin will be in North Texas, and then we're going to end in San Antonio for Dream Week, here during MLK weekend, which is going to be really, really powerful.
Langston :Okay yeah, so we got Aunt Lucy and we got Nicota on here. They're Aggies like me, so any prize, we got to figure out a way to get this to come to A&T. Oh yeah, you let me know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Speaking of Nicota, his question is can you speak to the impact of nature on overall mental?
Alex Bailey :health. Oh, yes, I know like I'll just speak from personal experience. You know, as I was starting Black Outside, I was going through this. You know intense personal life experiences that just lost my grandmother was going through a really intense separation to be open, and for me I think I should have just you like just getting outdoors before the call, like getting outdoors was a really powerful way for me to just relieve, like stress and just decompress and disconnect with the world around me, and so that's why these spaces are so important, even for our kids, right? So first time for especially Generation Z and now Generation Alpha, which we just started to serve, so they call it Generation Alpha.
Alex Bailey :Yeah, so they're the generation after Gen Z. I think. That's like if you're aged 10 and below, you're part of Generation Alpha. So we have some kids that are in our programs, that are there and like these are the first generations. They only know phones. They've grown up with phones all around technology and so, as beautiful as technology is how much access and information it gives you, we also know the down parts of social media and what that does, right. So it's really powerful for our kids when they get out to these spaces. I mean they just don't have service. So we actually which is kind of different from other programs people are surprised you have the kids have phones and like, yeah, we have time to only have servers, but, too, we want them to take pictures and have these memories because they're still part of that generation where that's a huge connecting point and I think it's powerful.
Alex Bailey :Our kids go back on Snapchat and on their Instagram page and on TikTok and they're posting videos of them dancing in the mountains in New Mexico, right, I mean that means something to them in their community and so for our kids and for ourselves, we really see the outdoors as this very healing, freeing space where you can finally, just decompress from the world around you, take a break from the social media and really just explore the curiosities of your world. We always say to our kids, especially when hiking the mountains, that we're like you're never going to conquer a mountain, right? A mountain's been here for thousands of years. You're here for thousands more years. You're never going to conquer it. So, instead of figuring out what you're going to conquer it from it, ask what you're going to learn from it, right? Yeah, yeah.
Langston :And so I'm getting deep up there, man, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Alex Bailey :Yeah. So we always say to that you know, in our experiences we don't teach our kids resiliency, that the outdoors just holds up a mirror to how resilient our kids are.
Langston :And that's an interesting way to not have a deficit orientation. Yeah, oh, we're big on that, yeah. I'm going to ask another question, yeah, and I'm going to tie this back to theme of just going from being an educator to an outdoor liberator. Talk about the types of support that you're getting and network that you have access to to do what you really want to do and transforming the lives of the black children, as opposed to what you did or didn't get when you were working in a traditional K through 12 setting.
Alex Bailey :You know it's going to kind of be a unique answer and then I'm going to talk to the more expansive answer. That starts with our families. Man Like I just I now have capacity being outside of the classroom. I now have much more capacity to. You know, one of our families is there's a grandmother and a lot of her grandkids are in our program during the middle of the day. Sometimes I'll pop over from getting pizza at tanks and pop over her house.
Langston :Hey, how you doing. Yeah, I thought how you doing?
Alex Bailey :What's up? How's it going? I wonder. I'm just dropping off some extra pizza to see how you doing? Yeah, so having a sheer capacity and space to check in with families in a very holistic, familial way I mean that network is so powerful because so many of our families have deep connection to it's really great. They have my number, though, checking on me. Hey, alex, how you doing, just want to know what you're doing. Can't wait for our kid to attend camp next time. Really, really beautiful. I'm just getting invited to graduation parties and all those things.
Alex Bailey :So that's the first thing of being outside the classroom, the school space, I have more space and capacity to cultivate deep, holistic relationships with a lot of our families. So that's really the first thing. And then, secondly, I think, the walls of schools. So I want to be clear I love education. I think it was a great experience. I would never take it back for anything that I did right. But at the same time, I always say that schools have four walls, you know, and I think a lot of times they limit the imagination, sometimes with teachers, and I think that sometimes there are some schools that are better about this, but it also just literally limits you to like your capacity of what's out there and I always felt like I was in a box. When I was in school I was like there's got to be more that I can do.
Alex Bailey :So I've been really blessed to be a part of some amazing leadership networks. I just became an Aspen Institute community fellow, healthy communities fellow, which has been really powerful to be connected to that network. Echoing Green has been really really amazing, transformative for me, to international fellowship for social entrepreneurs that use 30 every year from across the world. So in our WhatsApp chat I mean there's fellows from Oman, somalia, folks from all over and then across the US, folks from South America, puerto Rico, so that's been really really great. And then, yeah, also just connected like locally to like Notly, which has been really really great learning from other regional leaders about the work that we do. So I think, like getting outside of the education space really expanded my imagination for what's possible in the world.
Langston :And last thing, tell us where we can find information out about Black Outside the camps for people who are. Parents listening, want to give opportunities for their children. How can they get all this information?
Alex Bailey :Yeah well, first of all, thank y'all for going to attend and listening to me yapping about my life, my day and everything in my perspective on the world, super grateful to family that's tuned in and friends that have tuned in. So thank y'all for Black Outside. You can follow all work blackoutsideorg. Check out our website. See great pictures of our kids. We don't use stock images. Those are all real pictures of our kids in the outdoors. I don't believe in using those stock images. Right? Check us out on.
Alex Bailey :Instagram is our biggest social media format, especially our camp founder girls page is pretty lit. A lot of fun clips from camp, so you can check us out there. We do have a inquiry form you can fill out if you're interested, family or DM those accounts. Usually, within you know, three to four days, someone will get back to you and fill out a form and then you know if you love our work and want to support our work. Yeah, just know a lot of your donations goes to making sure we have the gear and the materials to like do all these amazing things. So, blackoutsideorg slash donate. We are 501c3 non-profit. We do fundraise throughout the year and, yeah, just know your dollars really go to ensuring that every single youth, especially black youth, that come through our program have equitable access to any outdoor activity they want.
Langston :Thank, you for joining this edition of entrepreneurial appetite. If you like the episode, you can support the show by becoming one of our founding 55 patrons, which gives you access to our live discussions and bonus materials, or you can subscribe to the show. Give us five stars and leave a comment.