Why is High Rocks for girls only?
We started with girls because girls were what we knew best. Girls in rural West Virginia have few examples of college women, professional women, or civic leaders who are women present in their daily lives. Single-sex education is something that has been celebrated by women’s colleges and the American Assosiation of University Women for decades. We have found that girls need to do several things to grow as healthy as they can. Girls need to play. Girls need to speak up. Girls need to figure out who they are and what they stand for. We have found that girls do this best in a same-sex environment, where sexual energy is minimized, body self-esteem is postive and non-judgemental, and girls focus on their own education and development. Girls feel free at High Rocks. Free to look dumb, free to make a mistake, free to hike a mountain no matter what their body looks like. Girls feel free to try out an idea that might be brilliant, to make a mud slip and slide in the rain, to raise the roof. We
