Philmont and Northern Tier require Wilderness First Aid certification in each crew. The American Red Cross has offered a course for this certification for a few years, developed by an ARC chapter in North Carolina. This spring, an entirely new, national ARC course titled Wilderness and Remote First Aid takes its place.

This new course has been developed in cooperation with the BSA and is based on our Wilderness First Aid Curriculum and Doctrine Guidelines - I bet you didn't know we had that, huh?

There's a flyer about the course Here.

It's 16 hours, like the previous course, but it should be less expensive, have more hands-on, and use consistent ARC materials. A few key differences about this new training:

• certification is 2 years instead of 3
• Current Adult CPR certification is a prerequisite
• Altitude Illnesses are included

This training is not JUST for Philmont and Northern Tier - every troop and pack should have people prepared to handle emergencies wherever they are. If it will take more than 20-30 minutes for an ambulance to reach you, these skills can be life-saving.

I'm really looking forward to presenting this new training to help keep Scouting safe!

Scout On