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The Explore Fund Council Promotes Access to the Outdoors

February 24, 2022  |  diversity equity and inclusion, explore fund, girl scouts, greening youth foundation, inclusivity in recreation, jose gonzalez, justice outside, latino outdoors, move mountains, myron floyd, outdoor access, outdoor grants, outdoor industry, paradox climbing, soul trak, the north face, tyrhee moore
a group of young people ride their bikes on a trail

The Explore Fund is a project from The North Face, an iconic outdoor gear brand founded in California in the mid-1960s. While The North Face still sells backpacks, hiking boots, and tents, more recently it has also invested some of its resources into building a more inclusive and accessible outdoor community. The Explore Fund, started in 2010, is the North Face’s flagship initiative in the field of outdoor inclusivity. It works to support community organizations fighting to break down the barriers that often prevent underrepresented groups from accessing outdoor recreation.

a young boy climbs on a rock wall

The Explore Fund does this by providing grants to organizations like Paradox Climbing, which focuses on providing adaptive infrastructure in climbing gyms, and Girls Scouts of the USA, which offers leadership training and outdoors experience to girls across the socioeconomic spectrum. The Explore Fund has also supported several other youth-focused organizations like Justice Outside and the Greening Youth Foundation. Another organization that received funding from the Explore Fund is Soul Trak. Soul Trak’s founder, Tyrhee Moore was the 2021 recipient of NRF’s Crawford Prize. In addition to grants that support inclusive programming, The North Face also offers Move Mountains grants designed to provide financial and networking support to women filmmakers who tell stories about the outdoors in their work.

two women sit and look at a view on a hike

In all of its efforts, The Explore Fund focuses on three central goals: 1) to celebrate the range of outdoor experience in communities that have not received adequate support from the outdoor industry; 2) to tell stories about human connectivity through exploration; and, 3) to partner with communities to reallocate decision-making power and create change in the world of non-profit work. The Explore Fund Toolkit outlines these goals and seven promising practices for doing community-based work aligned with this mission.

a woman smiles while outdoors on a walk

Although the grant-making portion of The Explore Fund has been active since 2010, in 2020 The North Face added a new component, The Explore Fund Council.The council is made up of BIPOC leaders who fill a range of roles within the outdoor community from researchers to artists to activists to educators. The council created the toolkit of practices informed by their own work in the field. Through their collective experience, the members offer valuable insight and guidance as part of the Explore Fund’s pursuit of inclusive exploration for everyone.

a child and a man fish together on a sunny day

Here at NRF, we’re especially proud to share two of our board members with the Explore Fund Council. Dr. Myron Floyd is the dean of the College of Natural Resources at NC State University and an award-winning researcher whose work focuses on increasing access to outdoor recreation among communities of color. Dr. Floyd counts his involvement with the council as one of the most meaningful professional experiences in his career. He noted that there “was such mutual respect and care within the group” and that the Explore Fund “created a space for authentic representation and self-expression that is often missing from this kind of work.” José González is the founder of Latino Outdoors and an educator and advocate dedicated to equity and inclusion in the outdoor and environmental fields. NRF’s overlapping mission of increasing access to recreation means that we’re excited to see where the leadership of the council takes The Explore Fund next. With such great people involved, it will almost certainly be towards something amazing.