North Carolina Outward Bound Grieves for Loss of 32-Year Master Outward Bound Instructor Dave Genova - March 30th, 2010

North Carolina Outward Bound is very sad to anounce the loss of Dave Genova, master OB instructor and friend to all. He passed away peacefully on the evening of Sunday, March 29, 2010.

Dave has continued to instruct NCOBS courses in the wilderness up until a few months ago – at the remarkable age of 67 - wanting to share his passion for Outward Bound with each new group of students he led. During Dave’s 32 years as an instructor with NCOBS and other OB legacy schools, it is estimated that he taught more than 2,000 students with compassionate and masterful guidance.

One of Dave’s many legacies with our School was the creation eleven years ago of the Unity Project, a school-based program that brings diverse students together in the wilderness to allow them to become “peaceful warriors” for racial equality, tolerance and understanding. More than 1,000 young people have been trained over the past decade to serve as compassionate leaders for social change in their schools and communities. In 2001, Outward Bound International named the NCOBS’ Unity Project the Outstanding Innovative Program of the year.

Below is a piece Dave wrote entitled, “And Above All Compassion.”

Dedicated to the Memory of Josh Minor

Compassion is the well-spring from which we derive our relevance as a school. It is the encouragement that a tired and sore belayer gives to a determined climber. It is the tear in the eye of a 15 year-old student who is leaving the room of an elderly, stroke victim after figuring out how to communicate by squeezing each other’s hand. It is the smile on the face of the semester course participants as they wave goodbye to the Miccosukee or Chilean children they have spent the day with. It is the power and sense of accomplishment felt by a crew member who has just lugged a forty pound tire on top of their backpack out of the Linville Gorge Wilderness. It is the internal grin of a young backpacker who removes a caterpillar from the trail so it won’t get trampled by heavy boots. It is the Unity Project graduate who intercedes for another student who is being bullied because in the eyes of the bullies, they speak too “gay.”

In all of these examples, the common thread is compassion in action. If we are successful as educators and as a School, it will be because for over forty years, we have continued to find a way to help our students nurture their innate ability to care and to act.

Dave Genova, 2009