Call Of The Wild: We meet the Oswestry teacher using the power of the great outdoors to help society's most vulnerable

Connecting with nature, pushing our physical horizons, embracing the actual world around us and thereby disengaging from the often toxic influence of the online sphere can lead to monumental benefits for the mental health of everyone - particularly society’s most vulnerable.

It can be difficult to make time to get back to basics and employ the indisputable healing power of the great outdoors in our daily lives, even in our county – the home of some of the UK’s most beautiful and pristine natural wonders.

Thankfully, one man has made it his mission to use Shropshire’s greatest natural health resource – its green and pleasant wilderness – to help all of those in need.

Based in Oswestry, Kevin McGarvey has dedicated his career to education, working across both mainstream and social emotional mental health (SEMH) settings.

Having worked in senior roles including head of department, director, and head teacher, he has developed a keen understanding of the support needed by neurodivergent and emotionally vulnerable many young people. 

With this, he has recently embarked on a new venture that he hopes will help change many lives for the better.

A safe space where structured teaching, emotional awareness, and outdoor adventure collide, Peak Explore has been created by Kevin to allow the power of the outdoors to help give confidence, heal wounds and breed mental contentment.

Centred around outdoor education activities such as bushcraft, mountain biking, paddle boarding and walking, Peak Explore has been welcoming participants who Kevin has been able to help build real-world strength, resilience and self belief. 

“My background in the education sector is primarily working in SEMH or social emotional mental health - often with the children that kind of tend to be excluded from the mainstream or struggle to manage their behaviour,” Kevin said. 

“In choosing to leave the world of being a classroom-based teacher, I wanted to continue to work with young people and help them through something that was exciting and captured them through different activities.

“There’s learning outdoors, and then there’s learning through the outdoors, and the latter is what I’m trying to help people do with Peak Explore.”