Hidden Villa’s leadership program focuses on social justice – values of inclusivity and environmental care were among the founding principles when Frank and Josephine Duveneck started Hidden Villa as the nation’s first interracial summer camp.
Hidden Villa is responding to requests for after-school programming that facilitates learning through outdoor play in the farm and wilderness area. The preserve recently launched a new After School Adventures program for kindergartners through sixth-graders.
Although residential development replaced most local farm plots and apricot groves decades ago, in one corner of Los Altos Hills, the art of farming persists. Hidden Villa’s program is unique in that everything found in the baskets is grown in Los Altos Hills.
The idea began when Hidden Villa Camp Director Nikki Bryant uncovered historical documents in the 70-year-old summer camp’s archives that described an adventurous backpacking trip the camp had sponsored in the Sierra Nevada.
A 2015 Living In Los Altos Zone excerpt profiles Hidden Villa’s teen apprenticeship program.
“Eight-week Animal Husbandry Apprenticeships teach teens to take care of animals including pigs, chickens, goats, cows and sheep. Sessions are currently scheduled in the winter and spring, and coordinators plan to continue the afterschool programs next fall and winter.”