Jun 24, 2021
Our guest, Erica Lorenzen Lengacher grew up in the Seattle area and has been a bit of a nomad since her high school years. Along with her husband, 8-year-old daughter, she is now happily settled in Whitefish, Montana.
She took a NOLS semester in the Rockies in 1993 (during a year off from college) and was immediately smitten with all that NOLS had to offer. Erica took a Mountain Instructors Course the following year and started working for the School in Alaska in the summer of 1994. During her NOLS years, she mainly worked backpacking, canyon, winter, and mountaineering courses, with a few oddball horse packing, sea kayaking, and NOLS Pro courses. Since leaving NOLS, she received a bachelor’s degree in nursing and a Master’s in public health. Her post NOLS career has ranged from public health consulting, to teaching high school science, too, most recently working as a critical care ICU nurse. She’s also just finishing a stint with the CDC Foundation doing COVID infection prevention and containment in long-term care and other congregate settings.
All told, she worked in outdoor education for about 15 years, primarily with NOLS. Still, she had a few seasons with Alpine Ascents and continued taking high school students into the mountains when she worked as an educator at the Watershed School in Boulder and the Bush School in Seattle.
In this episode: