THERAPEUTIC OUTDOOR ADVENTURE PROGRAM AND BEHAVIORAL HEALTH PROGRAMS IN NEW MEXICO
The Mountain Center (TMC) is a nationally recognized and accredited 501(C)3 educational and therapeutic organization founded in 1979 as Santa Fe Mountain Center. We are dedicated to promoting personal discovery and social change among youth, families, and groups through the use of creative learning experiences in wilderness, community, and cultural environments. We provide unique opportunities for people to transform their lives through remarkable experiences and adventures.
WHAT MATTERS TO US
We seek to stay relevant with the pressing social issues that affect the marginalized populations we serve. We combine elemetns of experiential education, youth organizing, movement building and social change initiatives in order to effect positive change on the individual and systemic level.
Our Staff, volunteers and board of directors are dedicated to delivering programs that help individuals find their inner strength, become resilient and step into their full potential.
HOW WE GOT HERE
The Mountain Center started strong in 1979. In our first year, we were selected as one of the ten outstanding experiential education programs nationwide to receive the US Department of Educations' model Program Award. In our first ten years, we received many state and national merit awards, and dozens of features in televised and print media. In the 1990s, we fortified our support base with more funding and acclaim in New Mexico and the US. In 2000, we earned accreditation as an Adventure Education Program through the Association for Experiential Education. In 2015, we increased our accessibility by becoming a Medicaid provider and building more facilities, and in 2018 we earned accreditation in Outdoor Behavioral Health Services, one of the most rigorous and prestigious certifications in our field. For four decades, The Mountain Center has persisted, evolved and established our presence as a national leader in experiential wilderness adventure education programs.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We, the staff at The Mountain Center, recognize and honor that we are on the traditional lands of the Tewa, Tiwa, Towa, and Keres people. We realize other Native people also live and move through these lands, including Apace, Dine, Hopi and many others. We acknowledge the historical and ongoing settlement of these lands has caused benefit to us all and unfair hardship to Native people. We value and appreciate Native people, knowledge, culture and contribution to our communities. As such, we are committed to the reconciliation with, and healing and upliftment of Native people and communities.
SOLIDARITY
The Mountain Center stands in solidarity with the local and national Black led movements against systemic violence, racism and abuse. As a behavioral health agency that embraces and works for social change and individual and community wellness, we are against racism and systems of oppression that injure and divide us and are especially harmful to Black, Brown an marginalized communities. Further, we would like to acknowledge that we live and work on traditional Native lands and that we are working for reconciliation with our Indigenous relatives. During this time, regardless of how you are supporting this and other movements to uplift communities of color and marginalized populations, we encourage you to care for yourselves and your community members. We are only as healthy and safe as the most vulnerable among us.