Executive Leadership Seminar

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This Funding Announcement is not a request for applications. This announcement is to provide public notice of the National Park Service (NPS), intention to fund the following project activities without competition. OVERVIEW The University of California, Merced Campus (UC Merced) will present, in collaboration with the National Park Service, Visitor and Resource Protection, an 11 to 14 day executive leadership seminar under the project name: National Parks Institute: Executive Leadership Seminar. The work may involve any combination of support functions - concept meetings, curriculum development, content meetings, and all phases of planning, speaker identification, venue selection, logistical and administrative support, convening the actual sessions, and presenting lectures, panels, field trips, and keynote speakers. Logistical and administrative support may include securing lodging and catering, transportation, arranging venues, attracting lecturers, processing payment, course announcement, facilitating scholarships and other tasks related to the business of presenting the seminar under the accepted practices of the University of California. The work may further involve: post-seminar proceeding documentation, facilitation of collaborative activities with the alumni each successive year after graduation; funding, and scholarship development, all related to NPS involvement with UC Merced in the presentation of the National Parks Institute Executive Leadership Seminar recurring annual sessions (2011 to 2015). The purposes of the seminar are to promote advanced leadership capacity for park and other protected area managers from around the world. Further purpose is to build a cooperating network of well developed managers that, through their web-based connections and well-exercised professional friendships – promote the highest possible level of environmental stewardship for ecosystem health, cultural resource protection, and for the security and enjoyment of the citizens of the world. The seminar content will stress developing the knowledge of managers to lead conservation work strategically in a world characterized by accelerating change and in the government context. The seminar venues may include Golden Gate National Parks, the campus of UC Merced, and the environs of Yosemite National Park. The course structure will be based on a case study format, augmented with panels, field trips in parks, keynote addresses, lectures, and workgroups that address each participant’s live park case study. Participants will include park and protected area managers from the American and international community of protected area agencies, non-profits, and corporations. The seminar and its perpetual follow-on alumni activities will also facilitate and improve participants understanding of the natural, cultural, recreational, scientific, and legal aspects of areas such as national parks, ecological conservation areas, wildlife refuges, marine sanctuaries, and state and local parks. STATEMENT OF JOINT OBJECTIVES/PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN UC Merced will cooperate on the sustained development of an educational curriculum with the NPS to present each year - for five years - an advanced leadership seminar geared to executives charged with protecting public lands and cultural heritage areas (as described in detail in Background and Objectives, above). Additionally, US Merced will collaborate with the NPS in a sustained program that develops an alumni network of information sharing and an international partnership of park managers assisting each other in real time with best practices, advice, access to research, idea exchange, cost-saving through shared objectives, information on emerging technology, and similar mutually beneficial programs. The seminar under this agreement will serve about 30 participants each year.

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