Caleb Dufresne

Program Director

Live Oak Camp

Caleb Dufresne was born in a small farmers town in central Vermont. It was a paradise of time moving slow, mountains to climb and rivers to explore. His love for nature was instilled from a young age and amplified by his summers growing up at summer camp in New Hampshire. After graduating from Philadelphia Biblical University with a Bachelor's degree in Theology and Biblical studies he went abroad for a mission focusing on supporting small church plants in Eastern Europe.

During that year, Caleb’s higher education and lived experience came to a crossroads over his acceptance of being a gay man. He left the mission field and pursued a new career in education through joining Teach NOLA in 2012. Those first three years in New Orleans were humbling, exciting and powerful as Caleb’s love for the city grew as a teacher, coach, and creator. He joined Youth Run NOLA as a coach, and was asked to create a program director role for the 23 schools involved in the program two years later. In 2014 he met Jack Carey, the founder of Live Oak Wilderness Camp and created the program for the first pilot camp of 13 kids. The connection with Live Oak was instantaneous and was able to join full time as the Program Director in 2016.

The past 8 years have been some of the best of his life. Live Oak has grown from a 15 person weekend, to a year round non profit serving over 350 families each year. He has been able to co-create a leadership curriculum for Live Oak’s leadership seminar, founded it’s first ever Wilderness Adventure which takes New Orleans kids on wilderness trips all over America, and facilitated year round programming for kids who go to over 95 schools in New Orleans.

Caleb started CMD Consulting in 2019. This LLC brings a hands-on immersive teamwork experience to students at schools to bring the power of camp for students who aren’t able to go over the summer. His dream for both Live Oak and CMD Consulting is to provide opportunities for kids to take an active role in their own relationships and explore their strengths at a young age and refine those skills at a young age.

Caleb’s side joy involves being the captain of New Orlean’s gay travel kickball team. He has coached queer adults for the last 6 years to help people reclaim their space in competitive spaces that have previously been unwelcoming to queer kids and adults. He is eager to connect with industry leaders across NOLA and build relationships with people who are doing great things in their fields.