Ole Miss Outdoors

Kenyotta Jenkins
Ole Miss Outdoors

Have you ever been on an adventure trip? Whether it’s white water kayaking or ice climbing, students at the University of Mississippi are experiencing trips like this due to Ole Miss Outdoors. Ole Miss Outdoors is a student run organization offered through campus recreation. They offer adventure trips, rebel challenge courses, and provide services to allow people to get out, even if it’s a weekend trip or a one day hike. The organization rents gear to students and the general public for their own trips. Ole Miss Outdoors also provides bike services to students who don’t have cars and need to get around on campus. The cost of bike rental is $25 for a semester.
Ole Miss Outdoors is mainly known for taking many adventure trips and their Rebel Challenge Course. Most of their adventure trips seem wild and fun at the same time. To get students more involved, the organization takes up to 10- 12 trips throughout the semester. Ole Miss Outdoors also plans smaller trips through spring break and during winter break. They are now trying to incorporate at least two trips this summer. The organization is currently trying to include more staff to attend trips so there will be less undergraduate students involved, and more participation by graduate students. An exciting challenge that has a lot of people signing up is their Swamp Stomper Challenge. Swamp Stomper races include canoeing, trail running, and biking. Although there will be plenty of students who signed up for the challenge, OMOD is contemplating ways to persuade the staff to do the challenge as well. One event Ole Miss Outdoors is expecting many students to join is the Ice Climbing trip. They will travel to Looking Glass, NC, to experience Ice Climbing and other adventurous courses.
The main focus of Ole Miss Outdoors is the trips they take to persuade students to get more involved with outdoors activities and to give them an experience of a lifetime. Most of the students that participate in these trips are freshmen and sophomores. In addition to letting them have fun, traveling, and teaching them about the outdoors, they try to give them the benefit of making new friends. A few of the students that usually sign up for the trips are alone, and once they depart, the students have established many unexpected friendships. Casey Armstrong, a graduate assistant for Ole Miss Outdoors, mentioned, “ Taking these trips are fun , we go many places that you wouldn’t expect; we want to get a lot of students involved so we can teach them new things and give them a great experience.”
On these trips, you would expect at least 50 or more students in attendance, but only 12 people at the most are allowed to travel; there were many students on the waitlist. Casey said, “However many students can fill up our vehicles makes the trip.” Students may travel far on these adventurous trips, but the trips are at affordable prices. The most you will pay for a trip is $500, that’s including gear and hotel fees. “I remember when school first started and we were going to the Grand Canyon; when students found out our list began to fill up in two days,” mentioned Casey.
Casey was asked if the activities benefited the community in any way, and he stated, “We have a lot of people come in and our clinics are useful, whether it’s backpacking or kayaking. Our activities mostly include the University, but we have people outside Ole Miss like high school students who are interested in learning about the outdoors.”