Tribal Wisdom Academy Day Camps

Tribal Wisdom Academy Day Camps includes activities such as blacksmithing, cold metal working, maker projects, mine digging, and creating wooden toys to bring home. Campers use real tools and power drills, build forest forts and digs, work on treehouse building, and set up kid-made ziplines and tree-to-tree slacklines. The program also features three target ranges, archery and BB gun safety, bow carving, Robin Hood skills, knife and tomahawk throwing, campfires at lunch, and creating their own business ventures with Tribal Coins, with alumni able to create advanced projects with a dedicated mentor and wood shop and also create businesses.

• Ages: 7–12 years old
• Schedule: Flexible choice of 1-week or 2-week day camps beginning on any Monday of the summer, with standard single week camps 1 week long
• Price: Standard Single Week Camps are $870 (optionally available in an automatic 3-pay plan of $290 with no added fees)

Odd-numbered camp weeks feature blacksmithing and student-inspired take-home projects, while even-numbered weeks feature five new take-home maker projects and cold metal working. Big Kid Adventure Maker Camp is the main camp, with 100 kids taking command of a large village of tree houses, and Wild Kid Graduate Camp and Alumni Village are available to campers who have attended previous summers. The Alumni Treehouse Village experience is described as a tween’s last two summers of being a Big Kid, and alumni may work in tribal government jobs such as an MIT (Mentor in Training) or as the Big Kid Camp Sheriff.

The program’s mission statements include “Preparing kids for any world future,” “Be prepared for any world future with the skills of tribal childhood,” and “Historic organic childhood, in the forest where it all began,” and it is described as a historic “analog childhood” experience. The program is locally designed by Ben Walker, who has over half a century of creative camp program experience, and Ben and Claire Walker have had a lifetime of careers in environmental and experiential education. Tribal Wisdom Academy Day Camps uses adult Mentors for safety and guidance with an 8-to-1 ratio, including some mentors who were tribal village kids from ten years ago, and all staff are vetted with Child Safe Training, extensive reference checks, California Department of Justice LiveScan fingerprinting, and national F.B.I. background checks. Master Crafter Staff are available to help each camper create wooden toys to bring home, nearly 2000-foot elevation provides cool morning weather, Ben has an AED in his car, and families are asked to have campers wear long pants, solid shoes, and bring a jacket all year.

Last updated March 6, 2026.