Wild Hearts Idaho

About

Wild Hearts Idaho is a non-profit that builds community, confidence, and leadership skills for middle and high school girls through free outdoor adventures. We aim to grow hearts for leadership through exploring Idaho's wild spaces.

Categories Program Children & Youth Educational / Vocational LGBTQIA+Mental Health

Program Details

Wild Hearts Idaho was created from a simple yet powerful question: "How can we empower teen girls to be courageous and confident leaders?" By connecting with teen girls, parents, youth advocates, and community stakeholders, we learned that girls in Idaho yearn for outdoor adventures that ignite their inner confidence and foster leadership skills. Girls desire experiences that immerse them in nature, challenge their comfort zones, and empower them to emerge as leaders in their lives.

Research shows that adolescent girls face significant barriers to leadership development, self-confidence, and outdoor recreation; a 2019 Girls Index report by the non-profit Ruling Our Experiences (ROX) found that as girls enter adolescence, their confidence plummets by 30% and their fear of failure increases. Additionally, girls are less likely than boys to participate in outdoor recreation, limiting access to experiences that foster independence and resilience.

Wild Hearts Idaho addresses these gaps by providing a supportive environment where girls can develop leadership skills through the immersion of outdoor adventures across Idaho's wilderness. Since our founding in May 2016, we have steadily expanded our programming to meet increasing demand. In 2025, we aim to facilitate 20-25 adventures for teen girls and reach more participants across the Treasure Valley. We aim to bring 125 girls outside in 2025!

Services Offered
Outdoor adventures including but not limited to:

Rock Climbing
White Water Rafting
Hiking
Backpacking
Camping
Stand Up Paddle Boarding
Bikepacking
Yoga
Leadership Development

Contact Serena Rasmussen, Executive Director serena@wildheartsidaho.org (208) 243-9559 Wild Hearts Idaho

Populations Served
Wild Hearts Idaho serves teenage girls ages 12-18 in the Treasure Valley and surrounding rural areas. We prioritize participants who may face financial, social, or cultural barriers to accessing outdoor recreation; they also represent diverse backgrounds across the Treasure Valley, as our adventures are designed to be inclusive and welcoming to girls of all skill levels and outdoor experiences. In 2024, we provided outdoor adventure experiences for 93 individual participants through multi-day backpacking trips, river rafting, snowshoeing, rock climbing, and day hikes.

Cost to Participate
Free

Staff Composition
One full-time staff and one part-time staff.

Wild Hearts Idaho in the Media

Google Workspace
Watch: Idaho x Wild Hearts Idaho: Gemini in Google Docs

Wild Hearts Idaho
Watch: Gala Video

A large group of participants express their excitement at the start of a backpacking trip. Trees and distant mountains fill the horizon behind them.

Three girls lean back in their water raft and enjoy the sun as they float along a wide river. Rolling green hills line both sides of the river.

A participant wearing protective rock climbing gear and harnesses smiles as she climbs a steep wall.

Six beaming girls stack on top of each other to create a human tower in the middle of a snowy, sunny day.

Recent Case Studies

Aerial view shows the meandering Buffalo Bayou waterway, grassy banks, and paved walkways.

Place

Buffalo Bayou Promenade

Buffalo Bayou Promenade transformed an area beneath a busy freeway into a welcoming urban park and recreation space featuring gently sloping banks, extensive native landscaping, hiking and biking trails, public art, interpretative signage, and a new pedestrian bridge.

Adults and youth stand by a rock dam built inside a dirt path with grass on the sides and trees in the background.

Program

River Source: Watershed Restoration with New Mexico Youth and Communities

River Source supports people as good stewards of their watersheds by providing science and policy education, planning, monitoring, and ecological restoration services throughout New Mexico.

Perennial gardens are filled with plants blooming in shades of purple and pink, with a bench in the background.

Place

Advocate Lutheran General Hospital Patient Tower

The landscape surrounding the Advocate Lutheran General Hospital Patient Tower provides a welcoming and healing space for patients, families, and staff. Multiple garden areas offer places for quiet reflection, conversation, and play, as well as opportunities for learning about stormwater management in an urban setting.