Black Hills Tour Guides
Syllabus

Everything the certification covers

This is the whole course, module by module, with what each one teaches and how it is assessed. It is here because nobody should have to guess what they are signing up for.

The testing is still being built and opens later this year. You can read the entire syllabus now. What you cannot do yet is sit the assessment. Leave your email at the bottom of this page and you will hear from us once, when testing opens, with the price and the levels on offer.
Foundation

The knowledge floor. Every guide takes all of it, and it is the shared language everything else is built on.

BHG-101

Reading the Landscape

How the Black Hills were made, and what they still do

After this module you can

  • Explain the Black Hills uplift to a guest in under 90 seconds without a single number they'll forget.
  • Point at any roadside rock on the route and place it in the right order.
  • Say why the Hills look black, and say the Lakota name it comes from.
  • Explain the Red Valley while the guest can actually see it out the window.
  • Connect the terrain to the 1972 flood, and know how to handle that conversation.

What it covers

The shape: a dome, strippedThe layers, center outwardWhy "Black"The forest is a fire system, not sceneryWater is the active agent
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-102

The Badlands

Deposition, erosion, and a landscape with a deadline

After this module you can

  • Explain that the Badlands were built by sediment, not pushed up, the opposite of the Black Hills.
  • Name the three formations in the wall in order, and say what each band is.
  • Deliver the erosion rate and the disappearance date, which is the single line guests repeat to other people.
  • Read weather and know why wet Badlands clay is a genuine safety problem, not a nuisance.

What it covers

Built, then cutThe White River Group, bottom to topThe WallOne inch a yearRain is the sculptor, and the hazard
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-103

Deep Time and Fossils

What is actually in the ground, and the law that governs it

After this module you can

  • Name the headline Badlands animals correctly and resist the dinosaur question.
  • Explain why this is one of the richest mammal fossil beds on Earth.
  • State collection law before a guest bends down, not after.
  • Turn the rule into an invitation using the park's fossil reporting program.

What it covers

The wrong era, spectacularlyThe castThe Big Pig DigSue, and why she is the cleanest example in this moduleThe Mammoth Site, Hot SpringsThe law, and how to use it
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-104

He Sápa

The Black Hills as Lakota homeland

After this module you can

  • State the treaty history accurately, in order, without editorializing.
  • Answer "who do the Black Hills belong to?" honestly and without flinching.
  • Know exactly where the line is between public record and knowledge that is not ours to tell.
  • Refer rather than perform, and be able to say "I don't know, and it isn't mine to tell" as a complete answer.

What it covers

The public record, in orderThe fact that carries the whole storyThe protocol, binding on every certified guideRefer, don't perform
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-105

Wildlife and Ecology

What guests came to see, and how not to get anyone hurt

After this module you can

  • Handle the bison distance rule without turning the vehicle into a lecture hall.
  • Explain a prairie dog town as an ecosystem rather than a photo stop.
  • Tell the black-footed ferret story, which is the best conservation story in the region.
  • Identify the common large mammals reliably, including which ones don't belong here.

What it covers

BisonPrairie dogs are the keystoneThe black-footed ferretThe rest of the rosterSet the expectation before you drive, not afterViewing ethics
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-106

The Carved Mountain

Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and holding two truths for one van

After this module you can

  • Deliver Rushmore's construction facts accurately, including the ones guides usually get wrong.
  • Describe Crazy Horse Memorial's origin, funding and unresolved disagreement without picking a side.
  • Hold a mixed van in which those two monuments mean opposite things, and not referee it.
  • Recognize when a guest is asking a question and when they are making a statement.

What it covers

Rushmore, the facts guides get wrongIt began as a tourism schemeCrazy Horse MemorialThe actual skill
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-107

Dark Sky

Running a night tour that works

After this module you can

  • Plan a night tour around moon phase before anything else.
  • Enforce red-light discipline over a group of strangers without being unpleasant.
  • Deliver the sky in the right order, so a guest can find their own way around it forever after.
  • Manage the specific safety problems of the Badlands after dark.

What it covers

Why it is dark hereMoon phase governs everythingThe Milky Way seasonRed light disciplineDelivery orderNight safety in the Badlands
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
BHG-108

The Guide's Craft

Interpretation, safety, and the last five minutes

After this module you can

  • Build a tour around one theme instead of a list of facts.
  • Say "I don't know" correctly, and close the loop afterward.
  • Run the safety decisions that actually come up here: heat, lightning, gravel, wildlife on road, poor cell coverage.
  • Handle the difficult guest, the silent guest, and the frightened guest.
  • Land the ending, because the last five minutes are what gets written down.

What it covers

Interpretation is not informationOne theme per tourThe "I don't know" protocolSafety, the real listThe peopleThe last five minutes
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
Places

One module per place you actually stand in. You take the ones you drive, so a guide who only works the Badlands does not have to study Devils Tower.

BHG-201

Badlands National Park

One unit, its owners, its permissions and its ways of hurting people

After this module you can

  • Say who owns and who manages each of the three units, and why that changes what you may do there.
  • State which authorization your operator holds, what it covers, and where the seat-count line falls.
  • Hold 100 feet from wildlife, which is stricter than the figure most guides carry in.
  • Run the Loop Road as a timed sequence with a known turnaround rather than a list of pull-offs.
  • Name the injury that happens most here, and prevent it before the first stop.
  • Check route status on the day of the tour instead of trusting last season.

What it covers

Three units, and they are not all owned the same wayThe authorization, which is the thing that can end an operatorThe Loop Road as a sequence, not a list of pull-offsOne hundred feet, and the number most guides carry is shortHow people are hurt here, in the order it happensOpen hiking, which is rarer than guests expectVerify the route on the day, because nobody tells you it closedWhat this place does not give you
Assessed by 6 multiple choice questions and 2 written answers. Five of six on the multiple choice, and every written answer rated meets or better by a reviewer. A single "not yet" sends it back.
Craft

How to guide, as opposed to what to know. Required for the Certified Black Hills Guide designation.

These modules are still being written, so there is nothing to sit in this tier yet. It is part of the standard, and the syllabus will say so here when it is ready.
Conditions and seasons

The days that are not ordinary. Winter, night, fire and smoke, storms. Optional by season, because a summer guide should not have to carry winter.

These modules are still being written, so there is nothing to sit in this tier yet. It is part of the standard, and the syllabus will say so here when it is ready.
Professional practice

Permits and whose land you are on, ethics, cultural protocol and when to refer rather than answer, and mentoring.

These modules are still being written, so there is nothing to sit in this tier yet. It is part of the standard, and the syllabus will say so here when it is ready.
Tour endorsements

A guide runs only the tours they hold. Each endorsement is three things: a route exam online, a shadow ride, and a scored check ride with a certified evaluator in the vehicle. Knowledge and delivery are assessed separately, because they fail separately.

END-BADL-DAWN

Badlands, pre-dawn and first light

Pre-dawn staging, cold and dark-adaptation carryover, the light window, wildlife at first light.
Requires M1, M2, M3, M5, M7, M8, P1, P8
END-BADL-NIGHT

Badlands, after dark

Moon-phase planning, red-light discipline, the delivery order, night safety and head counts.
Requires M1, M2, M3, M5, M7, M8, P1, P8
END-BADL-WILD

Badlands, wildlife focus

Distance rules, the keystone reframe, ferret recovery, reading behavior change as the threshold.
Requires M1, M2, M3, M5, M8, P1, P8
END-HILLS-WILD

Central Hills, wildlife focus

Custer State Park herd, bighorn and non-native goats, dusk road hazard, viewing ethics.
Requires M1, M5, M8, P2, P9
END-HILLS-CARVED

Central Hills, the carved mountain

Contested meaning in a mixed van, construction accuracy, the Red Valley and granite stops, treaty record.
Requires M1, M4, M6, M8, P2, P7, P9
END-HILLS-SHORT

Central Hills, condensed route

Theme discipline under time pressure, condensed carved-mountain material, hogback opener.
Requires M1, M4, M6, M8, P2, P7, P9, END-HILLS-CARVED

Tell me when testing opens

One email, when it opens, with what it costs and what the levels are. Nothing else, and never a mailing list. If you would rather just talk to somebody, the contact details are on the front page and that works too.