and spent nine years in finance with Intel Corporation, working with everything from an internet start-up to a $2.5 billion factory construction project. In 2002 he made a career shift and moved back to the Twin Cities. He spent nine years as the President of Youth Frontiers, a nonprofit organization that partners with schools to improve school climate, and reaches more than 100,000 students annually, before joining the VOBS Crew.

Outside of work, Jack is active in his church and community and enjoys traveling with his wife, Laura, and their three children, Elisabeth, Catherine and Timothy.

He also educated himself on what human activity is doing to the environment and tries to make lifestyle choices to minimize his impact and help heal the Earth. He is fortunate enough to share the stewardship of a summer cabin on a small lake and a few acres of woods and fields in the Avon Hills of Central Minnesota and it is his happy place.

Jay’s many interests and activities over the years have included running marathons and triathlons, playing in a folk music group and with a west African drumming group, Latin dancing (and even a bit of teaching) and organic gardening.  His winter focus over the last decade has been Nordic skiing – he hopes to complete his 8^th American Birkebeiner in 2021 although it will be a strange pandemic version of this much-loved ritual of winter.   He is primarily a skate-skier but plans to get back into classic skiing also because he can’t wait to explore the woods and waters around Homeplace!

Jay’s motivation to return to VOBS, other than the opportunity to work with awesome people, was that he believes that two qualities we need a lot more of in today’s society are compassion and resilience.  Development and nurturing of these qualities is central to the mission of Outward Bound and he can’t think of a better way to contribute than to lead the financial stewardship of VOBS.

you’ll find Holly tearing up over all the moments of impact she sees on a daily basis here at VOBS.

In her role as the Director of Marketing and Communications, Holly brings her natural story telling ability as she shares student stories to anyone and everyone who will listen. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Marketing and Public Relations from the University of St. Thomas, later returning for a Masters of Education in International Leadership. She spent over 10 years doing communication and recruiting for her alma mater (for both the undergraduate program and the law school) and another two years launching a new line of online certificates through Mitchell Hamline School of Law.

Outside of VOBS, you can find Holly back on the rink or links coaching high school hockey and golf, at her family lake cabin living it up, in her garden weeding and talking to her plants, or at home snuggling with her two adorable rescue pups.

Ten years ago Poppy helped launch the VOBS Twin Cities program.  In that time, we’ve served over 9,000 students. 

Now Poppy serves VOBS as the Director of Foundation Relations and Learning, ensuring we have the resources we need to provide access to Outward Bound courses for all young people by cost-sharing with our partners.  She also loves to dig into our impact, best practices and understanding current research, helping VOBS incorporate a reflective process to understand our strengths and improvement opportunities. 

These days, her favorite activities are snowshoeing, trail running, and learning new skills (she took up pickling in 2019 to rave reviews – look out Minnesota State Fair!). While in Southern California, she spent many weekends volunteering with cleanup on the LA River and on a trail maintenance crew and is eager to find new volunteer and stewardship opportunities in Minnesota.

Mary found VOBS after deciding to return to Minnesota and knew immediately it would be a perfect fit – marrying her love of the outdoors and desire to join a mission-driven organization. Mary’s excited to roll up her sleeves and get to work!

Favorite food: Spam sandwiches. We can blame my Kauai-born grandmother for that one.
Favorite color: Sage green. I want to say that I liked it before it was trendy, but probably not.
Favorite thing to do outside: Plan a big high-mileage day, but then decide to “call it” halfway through and take a nap on a sunny rock for a couple hours.
Favorite quote: “Please don’t injure yourself, you’re very clumsy.” -my dad

Bud came to VOBS, first as a student on an 8-day dogsled course. From that expedition, Bud recalls, “as we rounded the first corner on the frozen river a bald eagle flew overhead, our dog team trudged through the snow, and I instantly fell in love with the beauty of the Boundary Waters.” That was 2010 and Bud has been here ever since doing everything from instructing to training the dogs. Bud claims his colleagues as the most positive community of people to work with and his backyard/office as the most beautiful in the world. He has only taken a few hiatuses since he settled down in Minnesota. One was a four-month assignment working for Outward Bound in Hong Kong. The others have been to undertake expeditions on Manitoba’s Bloodvein River, Wabakimi Provincial Park in Ontario, and two dogsledding expeditions in Hudson Bay. In his little downtime Bud enjoys spending time with his daughter, disc golf, photography, mountain biking, ski-jouring, kite boarding, snowmobiling, canoeing, and anything else that keeps him outside and moving.

For the past five years, Abby has been working with students at the Voyageur Outward Bound School paddling in the summers and mushing dogs in the winters. Working as an Outward Bound instructor and course director has been a wonderful outlet for Abby’s passions and values – living in the woods, getting others to laugh and smile, and leading through compassion and service to others.

From there, she developed her roles and experience as an assistant instructor, lead instructor, course director and trainer, working in Philadelphia, Baltimore, Costa Rica and the Twin Cities.

The time came when she knew it was time to expand her comfort zone and practice what she preached on oh so many courses. In 2016, she applied to Teach for America and moved from her 100 square foot cabin nestled at the bottom of the North Cascades to a triple decker in South Boston. Laying the tracks as she drove the train, Anabell taught middle school science while simultaneously attending night classes, earning her Master of Education in Teaching and Curriculum from Boston University.

Yearning to be “home” and near family, Anabell moved back to Minneapolis in 2020 and began teaching with Hiawatha Academies. She has always lived and worked along Outward Bound's values and is beyond excited to be back within the community, back once more flying the Blue Peter, back “home”, ready to serve, to strive and not to yield!

In addition to her service at VOBS, Andrea has worked at a variety of other youth-serving organizations, including time as a naturalist and teacher at the country’s first accredited Environmental Learning Center, as a crew leader and work projects coordinator for the Minnesota Conservation Corps, and as a science teacher at an experiential education high school in Oregon.

While it was working in the wilderness that first drew Andrea to working for VOBS, she continues to work here because of the compassionate people she has met and gets to learn from every day. When she is not working with staff and students at Homeplace, Andrea and her husband, Brian, enjoy learning from and with their young son, Reed.

working up a sweat, bathing in rivers and writing postcards to loved ones. During some very long walks in the woods, Dan learned a little about gratitude, resilience, loneliness, compassion, positivity and the unforgiving wonder of wilderness.

A random act of kindness by a stranger during one such walk in led Dan to the Boundary Waters and VOBS in 2014, where he has traveled by canoe, foot, ski and dogsled ever since.

She returns to VOBS after earning a Master’s in Education, classroom teaching in Minnesota and Alaska and raising her family (which included homeschooling her children). She is the parent of three children who have been traveling in the BWCAW and other wilderness areas since they were infants. She lives on a small hobby farm in Duluth with her family, goats, chickens, cats and dogs. Libby enjoys running, reading, and wilderness travel with family and friends whenever possible. She is thrilled to be working with VOBS again and believes passionately in the Outward Bound mission and values. “We can do more than we think we can and we need each other.” (Kurt Hahn)

You name a job at the school and Ledoux has done it. Currently, she is the Logistics Manager at our Ely basecamp.

Of her current post, Ledoux says, “It’s a perfect job for me; I get to create systems that make gear and food an easy part of packing for a course. I truly enjoy working with all of the instructors – they are loud, entertaining, and inspire me every day with their love for their students.” When she’s not fixing something, cleaning something, or organizing something in the Trips building, you can find Ledoux running a small carpentry business, learning to skate ski in the winter and spending her springs coaching The Bears, a local Little League baseball team. Go Bears!

leading wilderness expeditions as an instructor for VOBS. It was there that he formed his educational philosophy, based in the values of compassion, service, mindfulness, leadership and diversity.

Having worked at VOBS since 2014, Adam has led expeditions in many different course areas, including the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and the Big Bend Region of Southwest Texas. Building his technical skills in whitewater paddling, rock climbing, and working with the Intercept Program has led Adam to step into the role of a Course Director, trainer and mentor, and now as the Safety Manager.

Rachel adores working with the variety of courses VOBS has to offer, and believes whole-heartedly in the power of outdoor education for all people.

Rachel has worked for VOBS since 2014, and can’t wait to help more staff and students find out what the wilderness has to offer them. When Rachel isn’t working at VOBS, she’s plotting out the next big dumb adventure she can partake in. In 2016, she and five other women competed in the Yukon River Quest, a 455-mile canoe race along the Yukon River, which involved minimal sleep and the maximum amount of paddling in 53 hours. She also spends most of her free time with her retired sled dog, Mia, who she spent over 100 days winter camping with before adopting her and helping her to become a couch dog.

During that time, Emily was a math tutor and took pride in helping kids go from thinking they are bad at math to getting engaged and excited about solving math problems. After graduating from Hamline, she decided to stay in Minnesota and that’s when she found VOBS.

Similar, in its own way, to getting a kid excited about their least favorite subject, Emily understood how challenge and discovery has the ability to change lives. Emily started at VOBS in 2015 as the Development and Executive Assistant, where she discovered her passion and skills in database management and analytics. Now, as the Development Associate, Emily helps the Development team get excited about technology and using our data to solve problems.

Latin American Studies, and Foreign Language Education from Miami University and by teaching English at Sun Yat-sen University in China. Some of her passions include backpacking, snowboarding, natural building, and herbalism. 

In the summer of 2019, she came to the Voyageur Outward Bound School as an intern, which gave her a breadth of exposure to different course areas and activities. Sam believes that Outward Bound has enormous power to affect positive change in our global community, and is honored to serve that purpose.

she served two years in AmeriCorps, leading paddling, hiking and other educational events for an environmental advocacy nonprofit in Asheville, NC. During her time in AmeriCorps, she also worked as a campaign manager for a North Carolina State Senator. Her time working in local politics and nonprofit advocacy lead her to pursue a Master's degree in Planning at Clark University. However, after two years of virtual classes and working remotely for a Massachusetts Regional Planning Commission, she was swayed by an offer to instruct a 15-day multi-element course at the Twin Cities Center for VOBS. Working outside, in-person, helping students find their confidence in the outdoors felt like returning 'home' and Catie is beyond grateful to be working at VOBS for the foreseeable future.

and studied Outdoor Education.

Her classes were nontraditional, as she got to spend her time learning and doing the skills she was being taught, like white water canoeing. She developed her love for canoeing when she was younger and it has only grown since graduating college. Since starting as an Instructor at VOBS, she has had the ability to grow her Instructor skills and continue to learn her canoeing and camping skills. She really enjoys getting to share the joy of all things outside with my co-workers and Students.

Tessa also spent some time as a senior naturalist in Homer, Alaska. 

Tessa came to Outward Bound in 2015 as an instructor and now works on our Student Services team year-round as a course advisor.  When Tessa isn’t busy helping prepare students and families for their expedition, she gets out alongside our students as a field instructor in the winter and summer seasons!

It is evident that Tessa has sought out a life filled with adventure in her professional and personal life. In 2014, Tessa was a part of the 8 Rivers North Expedition, where she and her crew paddle over 900 miles in 60 days, connecting 9 different rivers in the Canadian Arctic ending on the Arctic Ocean.  When she is not working Tessa spends her time thinking of the next adventure. She also enjoys exploring the local flora and fauna, canoeing, baking bread, and spending time with her community here at her home in Ely, Minnesota!

Public Health, with a focus on Community Health Promotion, from the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. She is passionate about health equity, reproductive rights and youth empowerment. In her role as Donor Engagement Manager at VOBS, Sarah is excited to bring more community members into the VOBS family and help fund life-changing programs for more students, especially students of color.

Sarah lives in Minneapolis with her adventure dog, Pringle, and loves to travel, read and explore new dog parks.

and moved in with her family in northern Wisconsin. Although her move to the Midwest was meant to be temporary, she fell in love with ButterBurgers from Culver’s, the amazing summer weather, the cost of living and the Midwest Nice culture (which was much needed after living in Boston).

For over a year, Kim worked as an HR Coordinator for Greenheck Group in the heating, ventilation and air conditioning industry. As the current HR Coordinator for VOBS, Kim is excited to return to the nonprofit world and support outdoor education. Kim currently resides in Minneapolis, MN with her dog Ari, whom she adopted from a local rescue in August 2022.

After spending a few years working in a laboratory studying water quality, Megan was eager to get back into working with kids in outdoor education. This brought her back to Ely where she worked at the Camp Widjiwagan Outdoor Learning Program before coming to work for the Voyageur Outward Bound School. Here at Outward Bound Megan loves getting to talk to families about all the opportunities they can have in the wilderness, and seeing how much students grow and change through experiential education. When she is not working you can find Megan out paddling in the summer, cross country skiing in the winter, and making lots of homemade pasta with friends and family. 

It was also through this program that he learned about Outward Bound and the opportunity to work with Outward Bound staff who were serving as consultants to the program. Enamored with their tales of adventure in the Northwoods, Elliott almost pursued a career at Outward Bound immediately following college, but decided to take a few years to live in a big city and work as a product design consultant. Unable to ignore his longing to work in a wilderness setting as an educator, Elliott eventually made the move to Northern Minnesota in 2016 and has not left since.