Internships can be a good way to increase the capacity of your organization. Interns can offer fresh ideas and insights while gaining experience and training from your organization.
The Selway-Bitterroot Foundation’s Wilderness Ranger Internship Program launched in 2009, and was a tremendous success. 2010 saw the program expand its training and produce another year of significant wilderness stewardship accomplishments. Over the course of the summer, the interns worked side-by-side with both Forest Service staff and Selway-Bitterroot Foundation staff. The diversity of leadership that the interns were exposed to provided valuable mentoring opportunities throughout the summer. Being exposed to a diversity of wilderness leadership styles allowed interns to observe different techniques, tactics and strategies employed in wilderness stewardship.
The field work throughout the summer generated a large list of accomplishments:
- Trail Opening/Trail Access: Interns cut over 1,740 trees out of trails, brushed over 47 miles of trail, removed rock from over 16 miles of trail, retreaded over 1000 feet of trail, and maintained over 275 miles of trail.
- Campsite Inventory: Interns inventoried 78 separate campsites in virtually every corner of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, including several that had not been inventories in decades.
- Campsite Restoration: Interns reduced or restored 18 campsites and removed an additional 54 campfire rings.
- Wilderness Education: Interns contacted 280 wilderness visitors this summer, providing wilderness education when feasible.
- Wilderness Trash Clean-Up: In partnership with the Nez Perce National Forest wilderness staff, interns hauled out over 35,000 pounds of trash (17.5 tons!) from the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, primarily from the former Seminole Ranch site near Moose Creek.
Overall, the Wilderness Ranger Internship Program had the effect of adding five full-time wilderness rangers to the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness. This increased the field presence of wilderness stewards from seven wilderness rangers and two lead wilderness stewards (employed by the Forest Service and Selway-Bitterroot Foundation across the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness) to 14 wilderness rangers, or an increase of 50% in field presence across the wilderness. Click on picture below to enlarge it.
To learn more about recruiting interns for your organization and to hear the benefits and challenges of an intership program, contact the Selway-Bitterroot Foundation: www.selwaybitterroot.org
