Exploring Sliding Scale Pricing: Making Nature Education Accessible
At Rainwalk Rewild, we believe in making wilderness education accessible to all, regardless of economic background or their current financial situation. Unfortunately, money is an uncomfortable topic for many people; and, we are often ill-equipped to have dynamic, healthy conversations about financial justice. In addition to physical and social access to nature and education, a person’s financial status is generally interwoven with their religion, sexuality, race, abilities, privilege, and/or physical location among many other possible interactions between and around the latter.
That’s why our commitment to accessibility and inclusivity is at the heart of our sliding scale pricing model. By offering flexible pricing, we are hoping to ensure that our programs are accessible to a diverse range of participants.
What is Sliding Scale Pricing?
Sliding scale pricing acknowledges that financial resources vary widely among individuals. This model allows you to choose a payment tier that best aligns with your financial capacity, ensuring that economic barriers do not prevent anyone from experiencing our programs.
Why We Embrace Sliding Scale Pricing
Promoting Accessibility: We firmly believe that outdoor education and experiences in nature should be accessible to everyone, regardless of financial status. Offering a range of prices allows us to welcome participants from diverse economic backgrounds, fostering an inclusive community.
Fostering Community: Our pricing model nurtures a sense of community and mutual support. Participants appreciate the financial contributions of others, creating a collaborative and supportive environment where everyone can thrive.
Supporting Sustainability: By offering multiple pricing tiers, we can maintain the financial health of our organization. Those who can afford to pay more help subsidize those who need financial assistance, ensuring the sustainability of our programs and allowing us to continue offering high-quality wilderness education.
The Tiers of Our Sliding Scale
To make our sliding scale easy to understand, we've categorized it into three tiers: Supported, Base, and Supporter Rate.
Supporter Rate (Top Tier)
This tier represents the true cost of our classes or services, reflecting the amount we would charge without a sliding scale. It’s for those who can comfortably meet all their basic needs, own property or have savings, and have an expendable income. Paying at this level supports our ability to offer lower-priced options to others.
Base Rate (Middle Tier)
This tier acknowledges those who may struggle with debt or live paycheck to paycheck but still manage to meet their basic needs. If you have steady income and occasional expendable income but face some financial challenges, this tier is for you.
Supported Rate (Bottom Tier)
This tier is for individuals who frequently stress about meeting basic needs, have significant debt, or are unemployed or underemployed. It’s designed for those who qualify for government assistance and have no or very limited expendable income.
We really appreciated the article and graphic created by Alexis J Cunningfolk of Worts and Cunning. It does a nice job of illustrating the realities and feelings one might have being in any of the sliding scale tiers.
Sacrifice vs. Hardship
When deciding where you fall on the scale, consider whether paying for a class would be a sacrifice or a hardship. A sacrifice means it might be difficult but not detrimental—you may have to cut back on or reprioritize monthly or yearly non-essential spending. One of our courses, for example, may be considered “non-essential;” although we consider many of the skills we teach to be quite essential indeed. A hardship means paying for the class would severely impact your ability to meet basic needs such as food, shelter, or transportation. Those facing hardship typically qualify for the lower end of the scale.
Our Commitment to Accessibility
We are committed to making our programs accessible. If the lower tier is still prohibitive, we offer extended payment plans and may be able to work out other solutions. Additionally, a limited number of slots are available at the middle and lower ends of the scale, so we encourage honest self-assessment to ensure those who truly need financial flexibility can access it.
