Mitchell Lamb went from Cambridge classrooms and water polo training to rafting some of the world’s wildest rivers, and now helps teenagers turn whitewater into a way of life. In this episode, Mitchell traces his journey from “relatively academic kid” to Program Director at World Class Academy, a travelling high school for adventure athletes that treats rivers, trails, and cultures as the curriculum.

We talk about his decision to skip the straight-to-uni conveyor belt and head to Tai Poutini Polytechnic on the West Coast, where two years of outdoor ed, 10-day bush trips, and full-immersion learning fast-tracked his maturity in ways a lecture theatre never could. Mitchell breaks down what those programs actually involve—costs, study load, the gear, the lifestyle—and how that diploma led to raft-guiding seasons in Turangi, California, Canada ...