By Ethan Clark

“Hey Grayson! Whatever you do, don’t look down.” 

I yelled this at Grayson Hepp (‘23) as I stared out across the 15-foot pitfall from the safety of the wooden platform. 

“Thank you, Ethan, much appreciated!” he snapped back. 

For the first time since early 2020, students were recently permitted to climb aboard Collegiate’s Stephen P. Adamson, Jr. (‘92) Ropes Course, located next to the Business Office. The course, spearheaded by Collegiate’s Outdoor Programs Coordinator (and Upper School history and Senior Capstone teacher) Brad Cooke, remained off-limits to students as the COVID-19 pandemic surged around campus and the world. The recent reopening has gotten many students wishing to be next in line. 

The Ropes Course. Photo credit: Ethan Clark.

Prior to its closure, the ropes course served as a hub of activity for students and faculty members alike for numerous classes. Classes such as Upper School physics and 10th grade biology used the course for students to perform experiments, like measuring kinetic energy or adrenaline levels in students before and after running the course. In the months leading up to Collegiate’s reopening, after months of lockdown, no one knew if the course would ever reopen during this school year. The course was a difficult thing to quarantine and run, given new CDC guidelines, so Cooke and his team of course-trained faculty got to work.

In the months and weeks prior to the reopening, Cooke and his faculty team were hard at work rerouting the course to ensure proper social distancing guidelines going forward. Students on the course will now navigate in a rounded path around the outer edge of the course from the central spire, and then up to the following two levels, before attempting the zipline at the very top.  

Cooke says, “It’s been so so exciting to have students back [on the course].” Middle School English teacher Nicholas Sberna, a member of Cooke’s faculty team on the course, says that “The zipline was fun, and scary at the same time; fun scary.” Cooke and his team have been working tirelessly this past semester to get the course fully operational for students again, and judging by the smiling faces of those high above the ground, their work paid off.

Brad Cooke Preparing The Giant Swing. Photo Credit: Ethan Clark

About a week after the initial reopening, it was announced that the Giant Swing, the ropes course’s later addition, was set to reopen and have its next trial run of students.

Upon reaching the course, all students participating in the Giant Swing are told the standard procedures and protocols: wear a helmet, don’t loosen your gear, and don’t go in the “kill zone,” the area in which a student would be swinging. Three students may then approach the swing: one being the student actually riding, and the other two being the “ladder crew” responsible for ensuring that the student swinging doesn’t fall off the ladder preemptively, and removing the ladder when the student swinging is ready.

Upon removing the ladder, every other student present then slowly pulls a long rope to raise the student swinging as high as they wish to go. Once the student reaches a desired height, Cooke then secures the rope so the others can let go of it and step back. Lastly, the student swinging is then free to hit the release button, which allows them to swing freely. Once the inertia of the swing has weakened, the ladder crew return to help the student down before the next person is permitted to step forward. 

The ropes course and the Giant Swing may not have gotten much attention during our COVID-era school year, but many students and faculty members agree that seeing the course open again prior to the end of the year has given them hope of a bright future. Finally students have gone back to having their heads in the clouds, or at least in the pine trees on the Mooreland Road campus.