Zugunruhe Experience

Zugunruhe Experience is different from other youth programs, as it takes place over the entirety of our student's middle school years. This allows us to foster deep relationships with our students, providing a safe space for them to express themselves and grow into the adults they wish to become.

We currently work with inner city youth in North and East St. Louis. We value equality and equal opportunity for all, and hope to integrate students from all races, gender, and socioeconomic backgrounds into our program as the Zugunruhe Experience expands! We believe that all new experiences are a way for youth to relate to each other regardless of where they come from.

We work with our students throughout the spring semester volunteering in the community and having weekly Zugunruhe experiences together. We culminate our Zugunruhe year by going on a trip together in the summer where we tie everything we've learned on in our semester together to have one last bonding experience. On all our adventures whether it be Arkansas, Colorado, Memphis, or Chicago. We incorporate hard skill and soft skill development into all of our experiences. "Hard skills" are activities such as rope courses, hiking, climbing, canoeing, and group games. Facilitators use this hard skill as an opportunity to incorporate "soft skills" such as confidence, teamwork, and how to overcome obstacles while building their emotional intelligence and self-awareness. These soft skills become transferable to students' everyday life. In order to ensure students are absorbing skills through this learning strategy, facilitators lead an end of the day debrief. This gives the students an opportunity to process what they've learned, and discuss their feelings and thoughts about the day's activities. These debriefs are a brave space. Rather than sitting at a desk, students are able to participate in tactile learning, which allows them to absorb information and develop new skills without realizing it. We believe this fosters community, and gives students a positive association with learning and school.

Something that we've been asking ourselves since the beginning of our organization is how to measure the "success" of our students. However, we believe that success is subjective to the individual as each student is different, so it will therefore look different for each person. By allowing each student to determine and dictate what success means to them, we are able to remain student focused as we support them in developing their goals throughout the curriculum. We continue to have conversations with our team about ways that we can put success on paper, but to observers, it may be difficult to see the milestones our students have made since we do not create their goals for them or have them follow strict guidelines in what their goals "should" be. We want to ensure our program allows each student to be themselves, and become who they want to be, not who we or society tells them to be.

Most importantly, through our organization, we have been able to foster change within the community. We recognize the invisible borders that separate St. Louis by race, culture, and socioeconomic background. We have been able to challenge ideas and begin to break down the barriers that segregation has built within the city. We encourage community involvement with our students through our volunteer program, and we ask our volunteers to be as involved as possible within the Zugunruhe community and the communities we are based in. While we continue to work in different schools, we hope to continue crossing these boundary lines, bringing light to new perspectives, and challenging assumptions.

Through donations such as yours, we would be able to continue to expand and break down the barriers that hinder every student that enters our program from expanding their comfort zone, and support them in taking flight!