An area business is starting a new program that will give underprivileged children a chance to learn respect for their surroundings, for each other and, most importantly, for themselves.

B&B Mountaineering, a combination of a climbing gym, guide service and outdoor store, is offering a program called Expedition Kids for the summer of 1998.

The program will work with nonprofit organizations and schools to give underprivileged or undermotivated kids the opportunity to take a five-day trip to Yellow River State Forest in northeast Iowa.

Guides will teach the children how to pack a backpack and cook food outdoors, as well as a combination of backpacking and climbing techniques.

Ward Black, co-owner of B&B and co-founder of the program, said they plan on taking not only kids who can’t afford the trip, but also kids who don’t perform well in school and who lack motivation.

“If there is a kid with low grades, and the teachers and counselors are saying, ‘We don’t know what to do with this kid,’ we think this program can help them,” he said.

Black had personal motivation for starting the program.

“If it wasn’t for a trip similar to this one, I probably wouldn’t be where I am; I would have chosen drugs and [undesirable] people instead of climbing,” he said.

The trip that helped him find his motivation was called Outward Bound, which Black said also started as a program for underprivileged children but has since grown into America’s largest outdoor school. He said B&B’s basis was somewhat inspired by Outward Bound.

Black said what is unique about Expedition Kids is its emphasis on “old mountain philosophies with Eastern culture emphasis.”

He stresses that the program is about more than just having fun and learning to backpack and climb.

“Our motto for the program is: ‘Good habits can be habit-forming too,'” Black said. “We want to install good solid habits they can fall back on, skills they can use in real life.”

Expedition Kids’ six main teaching objectives are trust, respect, courage, happiness, confidence and perseverance, Black said.

One of the ways the program is incorporating these Eastern philosophies is by introducing someone to act as a sherpa to help guide the groups. Black defined a sherpa as an Eastern religious mountain man, and said they are found around the bigger Himalayan mountains, like Everest and K2.

The program will also emphasize a “leave-no-trace philosophy” of protecting and preserving the environment.

He said teaching an understanding of other cultures and the environment helps build respect, which in turn builds a feeling of self-worth.

The trip is a not-for-profit event. B&B is currently applying for grants to help defray the cost of supplies and transportation, and it encourages interested organizations to also apply for grants. Black assured that the kids themselves will not have to pay for anything.

Expedition Kids will have three sessions: one in June; one in July and one in August. There is a limit of 16 people in each group.

For further information contact B&B Mountaineering at (515) 769-2250.