Initiatives for 2026 (take the Survey)

January 11, 2026

Members and Friends of Up North Orienteers –

Welcome to 2026!

The link to join or renew your UNO membership is now available at – Join UNO

Annual membership remains $30 for an individual / $50 for a family and runs for the full calendar year. Annual membership entitles you to run all UNO local events for no charge, including ‘normal courses’ at Camping Weekend. National Ranking Event (NRE) competitive courses and Camping Weekend special courses (Canoe-O, Vampire-O, Wicked Hard Night-O) are not included. Membership also includes Bring-Your-Own-Map (BYOM) / DIY courses and access to all UNO maps for training purposes.

With local meet fees remaining the same at $10 adult / $5 junior, it doesn’t take too many events to more than break even on a membership option. Plus you get that warm fuzzy feeling from being a member of a like-minded group of folks.

At the recent annual meeting, we got started on fleshing out this year’s calendar of events, but discussion moved over into how we can host more events at more venues to bring more of the joy of orienteering to our members and friends in 2026.

To that end, we are proposing a series of initiatives that we hope all of you will consider participating in to get more folks involved to support more events this year. Info on how to get involved is below:

  1. Virtual /on-line session (60-90 minutes) – UNO Event Hosting 101. What’s involved in hosting a local event – you’d like to help but not sure what that could entail? We’ll cover roles of the meet director, course setter, control vetter, registration and check-in, timing, publicity, other day-of support, etc. Understand what you (and a couple of friends) can do to get the ball rolling to hold an event on your favorite map.
    1. Proposed dates – Thursday Jan. 29, Monday Feb. 2, both at 7:00 pm. If we can figure out the technology, we’ll record these sessions for those who can’t attend.
    2. Depending on interest, future sessions are possible to expand on any of the specific initiatives.
  2. UNO Calendar Crew – Manage the UNO event calendar – line up venues, meet directors, course setters and otherwise ease the burden of hosting numerous local events. Coordinate event schedule with NEOC and other regional O’ clubs.
  3. School/camp/youth group orienteering – Orienteering USA and Cambridge MA-based Navigation Games have been presenting at several teacher conferences in our area, raising awareness of orienteering and the Youth Mapping Program which supports getting low-cost school yard maps for interested schools and camps. UNO has one introductory school O’ kit suitable for starting orienteering programs at schools & youth programs and we plan to get more. This initiative will focus on making these kits available at no cost to schools and camps to sign out for the duration of their O’ activities. Team will spearhead publicity in the UNO footprint on this new program, manage delivery and retrieval of the kits, and seek additional volunteers from within UNO to assist at schools and camps with implementing the O’ activities.
  4. Permanent / DIY courses – Establishing permanent markers at currently mapped venues with landowner permission, develop courses and map to be posted on the UNO website for free downloads. Also plan Bring-Your-Own-Map (BYOM) events – normally available for a specified time period, with a few levels of courses. Develop course maps to be posted online – free downloads for UNO members, nominal fee for non-members. These can be set with streamers or flags in the forest or using a smart phone app that allows for virtual punching when you’re at the correct location.
  5. Spring/Fall Point Series – Manage publicity, scoring and prizes for a friendly competition over several local events in a season – runners earn points based on finish standings at events on a particular course level (White through Red). Need to run at least (X-?) number of the X courses in the series. See NEOC’s website for how this might work – NEOC 2024 Fall Point Series and NEOC 2025 Fall Series Wrap-up
  6. Scout Orienteering – Coordinate publicity to the Scouting community about UNO events to meet advancement and merit badge requirements. Explore opportunities for scout-specific events. There is now an orienteering map of Griswold Scout Reservation – help with getting a Scout/public event going there sometime in 2026.
  7. Mountain Bike Orienteering (MTBO) – Spearhead establishment of MTBO specific events. Coordinate schedule and publicity with the local mtn bike community. Note potential for advanced competitive participation at the World MTBO Champs.

A Google Forms Survey – UNO 2026 Initiatives Interest has been created to capture contact information for individuals who are interested in being involved in any of the above areas. Please take a moment to go to the survey via the above link and check as many of the areas you would like to help with or know more about.

Survey will be open through Sunday, January 25. There will be a follow-on Google Meet session for each area, with invitations to be sent after the 25th.

Contact Jim Arsenault (jearsenault@gmail.com, or unorienteers@gmail.com) with any questions or issues with this survey.

Jim – Numero UNO / President, Up North Orienteers