By Lindsay Peyton

Perched among the trees in West Seattle’s Camp Long are a series of tests, both low to the ground and high in the air, designed to test mental and physical abilities. What may look like a series of logs or platforms or posts are actually structures used for personal development and team building.

Laura Levings has worked as a facilitator on challenge courses and as a mental health counselor for nearly 30 years. “When I first did the challenge course, I realized how incredibly powerful it was,” she said. “It’s almost like you’re doing a year’s worth of therapy in one day for some people.”

Each year, Levings brings teens from Kaiser Permanente’s School-Based Health Center Program to experience the challenge course at Camp Long, 5200 35th Ave SW.

She works with students who attend the Interagency Academy. There are 11 locations for the alternative high school around the city, including one at Youngstown.

“Every year, I take three of our sites out,” Levings said.

Levings offers a six-part series, sponsored by Kaiser Permanente and created in collaboration with Seattle Parks and Recreation and Washington State University’s 4-H Adventure Education program.

The students start rock-climbing with the Mountaineers. Then they move onto the low course at Camp Long. They finish at the park on the high ropes.

Levings said that the challenge course allows her to teach several lessons in one. She talks to students about trust, support and building community.

“We all have a comfort zone,” she said. “Get outside of that, and you get into the learning zone.”

Her goal is teaching through experience. She mentions the quote, with an unknown source, “ I hear things, and I forget them. I see things, and I remember them. I do things and I understand them.”

That’s why Levings takes extra measures to make the experience as meaningful as possible.

“You can have this powerful experience for a day or you can frontload it an make it a metaphor,” Levings said.

She asks her students to think of a challenge in their own lives and voice what they are facing, before they crawl out on a wire, the height of a telephone pole and cross it, hooked into a harness.

Some students say they want to graduate. Others focus on career. Some talk about life-challenges they are facing.

Then, they march forward.

“Everyone has walls in their lives that we can try to get over and get around,” Levings said.

Even the teachers join the students on the course, to show the students that all ages face difficulties and push to persevere.

At the end of the day, Levings challenges participants to consider how they will incorporate what they have learned into their everyday experiences. “How are you going to take it forward and use it in your life and at school,” she questions. “How are young going to take these tools and apply them?”