Educational Program News
Congrats to our New OET TEs
Author’s Note 4/30/2026: This post has been updated to include additional Trainer Evaluators whose certifications were finalized after the original publication. We’re glad to recognize them here and appreciate our new TEs’ contributions to the OET Program!
The Outdoor Emergency Transportation (OET) program provides patrollers with advanced on-snow training in skiing, riding, and toboggan handling to ensure guests can be transported safely and efficiently to higher levels of care. OET Trainer Evaluators serve as regional staff responsible for training and evaluating Senior OET candidates, helping maintain consistent, high-quality instruction across the division.
This season we congratulate and welcome eight new OET Trainer Evaluators. Their dedication to excellence in skiing, toboggan handling, teaching, and mentorship strengthens the quality of training throughout the patrol community.
Two Bike Patroller Schools This Summer!
The Eastern Division Bike Program is announcing two different bike patroller schools! Any NSP member is welcome, regardless of whether you’re on a bike patrol. This includes hosts, patrollers, Nordic patrollers, and physician partners. You do NOT have to be a bike patroller, just have an interest in learning.
The first patroller school is hosted by GROC Mountain Bike Patrol in the Genesee Valley Region. It will be at two parks that have cross-country trails designed by and for mountain bikers.
What Award to Give in an OEC Incident
So, you know an OEC incident (can be anywhere, at a ski area or not) where a patient with a critical injury was handled by one or more individuals in an outstanding manner. They saved the life of the patient or kept them from having a negative quality of life outcome. You want to give the team an award, but you aren’t sure what award to give. Here is how to determine which.
The word individual used here refers to patrollers, hosts, or alumni. Individuals must be up to date on their OEC/OFC and dues. Only one merit star per individual per incident may be awarded. What incidents qualify?
Nordic/Backcountry Roundup
Bolton Nordic Patroller School was our big event of the season and Ullr, the Norse God of Snow, delivered. With fresh snow on both Friday and Saturday nights we were primed for both XC and backcountry skiing evaluations! We minted four new senior Nordic/Backcountry Patrollers as well as two new Nordic Patrollers. Typically, we also do a Nordic Master evaluation, but this year our candidate had a medical issue just before the event was to begin. They will be back for next year.
Outstanding Alumni & Patroller Event
Melanie Musczynski, EDIV Safety Team & Oliver Loewen, Stratton Patrol
No matter how you look at it, the 2026 Eastern Patroller and Alumni Event was an outstanding success. There were over 100 people signed up to participate, more than double last year’s event. The evening events with NSP Board members Rich Pietrafesa and Butch MacQueen, the NSP Safety Team, and the history of the 10th Mountain Division were well attended and very informative.
Stratton Mountain did a great job welcoming us. The daily events included touring the snowmaking operations, the Carlos Otis Clinic and First Aid Center, and the Patrol Summit HQ. These provided us insight into some unique attributes of the daily routine of different departments at Stratton. Matt Jones, CEO of Stratton, even came and talked about the resort, the ski industry, and answered questions from us all.
Women’s Programs Galore
Women’s program events were held all over the Eastern Division this year. A One-Day Women’s Toboggan Event was held at Elk Mountain on Friday, January 23. It was a huge success! Twenty women and several instructors from Eastern New York and beyond took to the glades, steeps and bumps on Friday, February 27 as part of Gore Mountain Women’s OET Clinic. And an amazing women’s empowerment clinic was held at Bristol Mountain on Saturday, March 7. Click below to read more about each event.
Bike Season is Coming!
For most of you, your patrolling season is about to end. But bike patrollers are just now preparing for our upcoming season! Many of the bike patrollers you see out there are, in fact, year-round patrol members, also serving as alpine or Nordic patrollers in the winter.
Coming this Summer from the Bike Program
Watch for upcoming events and news. The bike program is still developing and growing across our division. Bike patrollers across the U.S. serve in many areas, including urban roads/gravel trails, in XC/backcountry locations, and at downhill/gravity bike parks (these work more like the typical alpine patrol).
Red Merit Star
The Red Merit Star fills a unique and necessary recognition gap—honoring patrollers whose instinct, training, and intervention made a profound difference, even when the patient may not show or present with immediate life-threatening signs.
Unlike the NSP Purple Merit Star, which recognizes life-saving interventions, the Red Merit Star acknowledges situations where timely and skilled action, including load and go, which may have prevented a potentially catastrophic outcome, but where the injury or illness may not have initially presented as immediately life-threatening.
Nordic/Backcountry in The Glades
What a time we had at Pike Glades! The weather was perfect, the snow was deep, and everyone made new friends! Thanks to Orest Ohar and Linda Helms from the Eastern Division’s OET Training Team, we received training in the use of two types of breakaway two-piece toboggans.
One was a two-piece Cascade 100 with belay points and handles typical to the Cascade Legend. The other was a carbon fiber, four-handle AKJA two-piece toboggan. A big thank you to Jay Peak’s ski patrol for letting us use the AKJA! We all learned a lot about running these sleds through the glades.
Our SAR exercise using Caltopo teams had all searchers recovering their hidden prizes. Look for this event again next season, especially if your ski area deals with lost area skiers out of bounds.
Avalanche – End of Season Update
The Avalanche teaching season has come to an end for the Eastern Division. This year we successfully ran two Level 1 classes and one Level 2 class. A total of 44 students completed their Level 1 training, and 12 students completed Level 2.
We had an amazing group of patrollers participate in the programs this year. Everyone was fully engaged in their learning and went above and beyond to complete both their online and in-person coursework.
We also had two new Level 1 avalanche instructors complete their mentorships. Congratulations to Jeff and Val Luby for their hard work and dedication to the program!
Looking ahead to next season, we plan to run three Level 1 classes and one Level 2 class.
