{"id":36022,"date":"2023-01-31T22:30:07","date_gmt":"2023-02-01T05:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/sos-outreach-alumnae-present-their-one-of-a-kind-nordica-ski-design-at-silverton-fundraiser\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:28:55","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:28:55","slug":"sos-outreach-alumnae-present-their-one-of-a-kind-nordica-ski-design-at-silverton-fundraiser","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/sos-outreach-alumnae-present-their-one-of-a-kind-nordica-ski-design-at-silverton-fundraiser\/","title":{"rendered":"SOS Outreach alumnae present their one-of-a-kind Nordica ski design at Silverton fundraiser"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"SOS
SOS Outreach alumnae Veronica Saint Jane, left, and Heidy Hern\u00e1ndez show off the one-of-a-kind Nordica ski they helped design, along with Frida Quintero and Delaney Muro (not pictured), at a fundraiser for the nonprofit in Silverton. (Courtesy of SOS Outreach)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Four female graphic design students showed off their new ski design during an annual fundraiser held mid-January in Silverton for SOS Outreach, a national nonprofit for at-risk and low-income youths \u2013 of which the women are or had once been members.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur whole goal is primarily youths development,\u201d said SOS spokesman Spencer Cox. \u201cThis was an awesome opportunity that we were able to do in partnership with Christy Sports and Nordica with these four young women, two of whom are current participants in their final year of the SOS program as seniors in high school, and two alumnae who are both graphic design students in college.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cox said the nonprofit was able to connect the four women with Christy Sports and Nordica through a program SOS Outreach launched two years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is kind of an extension of our Career Development Pipeline program, which we first piloted in the summer of 2020,\u201d Cox said. \u201cWhen we launched this program, we were able to connect our high school and alumni participants with paid internships in the outdoor industry for six weeks over the summer, leveraging some of our amazing corporate partners.\u201d<\/p>\n

The goal posed to Utah native Heidy Hern\u00e1ndez, 21; Washington state native Veronica Saint Jane, 18; California native Frida Qintero, 17; and Colorado native Delaney Muro, 18, was to \u201ccreate a one-of-a-kind ski that can be found nowhere else and tells a story no other ski could,\u201d according to SOS Outreach\u2019s website.<\/p>\n

At first, the women had varying ideas of what design to put on the skis, including a glow-in-the-dark theme. They quickly learned, however, the limits of what they were working with when it came to manufacturing constraints. Eventually, the four designers\u2019 vision began to unify and a concept was born.<\/p>\n

\"SOS
SOS Outreach alumnae\u2019s final Nordica ski design, heavily inspired by the town of Silverton and its positive influence on the four women. (Courtesy of Christy Sports)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWe though a lot about what values we wanted the ski to represent,\u201d Quintero said in an interview on SOS Outreach\u2019s website<\/a>. \u201cWe wanted the ski to tell a meaningful story.\u201d<\/p>\n

The women found inspiration in the town of Silverton, which hosts SOS Outreach\u2019s MLK Powder Challenge every year, and settled on topo lines of the geographical area, bright colors, and an inclusion of the SOS logo.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdding the SOS logo to the ski was important,\u201d Delaney said in an interview on SOS Outreach\u2019s website. \u201cI hope folks who purchase this ski walk away with a deeper connection to SOS. This was something that was designed with intention and so much love and passion. We really want people to know about all the good this program does.\u201d<\/p>\n

SOS Outreach began in 1993, when its founding members took 15 Denver-area youths to Vail to learn how to snowboard. The goal was to teach the kids the transformative power of the outdoors.<\/p>\n

The nonprofit has since grown to 15 locations in nine states, with more than 3,000 students enrolled in its outdoor, mentoring and career programs year-round. According to its website<\/a>, it has helped more than 80,000 youths over the last 30 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo qualify for our program, you need to take a strengths and needs assessment,\u201d said Cox of the program\u2019s youths applicants. \u201cYou basically need to meet two needs out of a list of about 20.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt can be a variety of different factors that qualify you for our program. An example could be coming from a low-income household and also being a victim of bullying in school,\u201d he said. \u201cThat would qualify you for SOS. It could also be struggling with mental health issues and having difficulty focusing in school. So, we have kind of a wide array of challenges that you face, and if you qualify for or meet two of those, then you qualify for our program.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cox said SOS Outreach\u2019s purpose has always been to provide support for its at-risk youths members through community support and career or education pathways once they graduate high school.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ultimate goal is building a strong sense of community for youths and equipping them with skills for life, whether that\u2019s career readiness, skills for applying to college, and then just generally focusing on social emotional learning skills,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"SOS
SOS Outreach spokesman Spencer Cox said the significance of who designed the skis should not be overlooked. \u201cThey all identify as women of color, and the ski industry for so long has just been homogenously male and white,\u201d he said. (Courtesy of Christy Sports).<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Cox sees the collaborative design between the four women and outreach members as a perfect reflection of the organization\u2019s goal of bridging opportunities for underprivileged youths.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey all identify as women of color, and the ski industry for so long has just been homogenously male and white,\u201d Cox said. \u201cTo have these four young women leading in that change and being able to have a ski that\u2019s their own and tell a story that\u2019s their own is particularly powerful.\u201d<\/p>\n

The skis are currently for sale online at Christy Sports<\/a>. The entirety of the proceeds from its sales will be donated back to SOS Outreach and its programs.<\/p>\n

Hern\u00e1ndez, Saint Jane, Quintero and Muro have named the ski \u201cUnleashed Outreach,\u201d in honor of both the Nordica brand and SOS Outreach.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want this ski to encourage people to push themselves to new limits out on the mountain and embrace opportunities in all aspects of their life,\u201d Hern\u00e1ndez said in an interview on SOS Outreach\u2019s website<\/a>. \u201cWhether you\u2019re an expert or just learning how to ride in SOS, we all have room to grow.\u201d<\/p>\n

molsen@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

women are members of a nonprofit that works with low-income or at-risk youths<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36023,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,1269,327],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-36022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-nonprofits","tag-silverton"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36022"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83208,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36022\/revisions\/83208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36022"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=36022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}