Jun 24, 2019
Mary Hickey is a parent coach at Parent Coaching Professionals and Second Nature Wilderness. Her journey into the field started as a child at summer camp and progressed at Prescott College in the 1990s, where she first learned about wilderness therapy. Mary began working in the field in 1997 at WildernessQuest. She recounts the primitive skills orientation of WildernessQuest and how she became a lead instructor shortly after starting. She encourages those interested in the field to "be open" to the process and set aside personal agendas.
She shares how she did 210 field days in less than a year as she would work six weeks at WildernessQuest. Mary went on to work at Spring Ridge Academy, an all-girls boarding school in Prescott where 80% of the students had come from wilderness. She has moved onto doing parent coaching, and she shares how she works with families.