Once upon a time, the building that stood near the base of Sunlight Mountain Resort was just an unassuming ranch house. Before skiing became popular recreation in the Roaring Fork Valley, the far ends of Four Mile Road hosted homestead ranches, one of which belonged to Joseph Perko, who built his home there in 1907. Some six decades later, in the 1960s, a new building was raised on that space, the Sunlight Mountain Inn, to serve as lodging for the newly established commercial resort.
In recent years, the rustic hotel gained a new name, the Gnarly Inn, under the ownership of Valley entrepreneur Altai Chuluun. Long interested in finding creative ways to serve community, Chuluun is further transforming the building. He has been helping connect Valley youth with career opportunities for nearly a decade; over 20,000 local youth have attended the GlenX career expos Chuluun organized. In 2017, he helped launch what is now Coventure in Carbondale. The cowork space helps to bring young professionals together and foster entrepreneurial endeavors.
Chuluun’s latest goal is to transform the Gnarly Inn into a hands-on, experiential learning vocational school. The concept keeps his long-favored name for community empowerment projects: GlenX. His vision is to renovate and convert the building over the spring and summer, so that the GlenX School can be operational by autumn 2025.
Chuluun’s team is approaching this goal via several tactics. One aspect is to keep the inn partially running even during conversions. In addition to renting rooms to ski tourists visiting the resort mountain, the Gnarly Inn also offers long-term room rentals to Valley locals in need of housing on a month-to-month basis. Though the lodge is almost half an hour outside of Glenwood Springs, the close-to-nature location is beautiful and an attractive option for outdoor enthusiasts.
The GlenX team launched a fundraiser earlier this month to start the school. The first threshold goal they hope to meet is $6,500, but the total fundraising goal is $100k, to cover staff and related expenses. One expense is providing a stipend for accepted students. One of Chuluun’s frustrations with existing education opportunities is the cost.
Post-secondary education almost always comes with a price tag, and trade apprenticeships can have low pay. Chuluun envisions a program somewhere between university learning and apprentice study, where participants in their early 20s can combine academic study with hands-on experience, while receiving a living stipend that allows them to focus on learning.
Chuluun sees this educational vision as filling a gap in the learning ecosystem in the U.S. and even around the world. With the GlenX School, he hopes to better bridge the disconnect between young students and young professionals in a variety of careers. By adding in this specific type of applied learning and growth, Chulunn hopes to further strengthen the Roaring Fork Valley community. The GlenX School is an option for connecting the empowerment local teens can access from career expos to the creative opportunity of cowork spaces for established professionals.
The grand vision, once the GlenX School is up and running, is to expand the program. Chuluun aspires to eventually grow the program into full operations for Sunlight Mountain Resort, facilitating hands-on skill development for students applying business management, operations work, hospitality, logistics and more. For now, though, he is holding the near-term vision of launching the GlenX School.
Chuluun and the GlenX team will post updates on their gofundme website: (www.gofundme.com/f/glenx-school). The fundraiser aims to help cover costs for setting up the new 501c3 and hiring initial staff for the young adult educational resource. Community members interested in getting involved with this project as student mentors or advisors or as GlenX School board members can contact Chuluun by scheduling a meeting on Calendly: www.bit.ly/GlenXCalendly