Heartland Vital Signs Monitoring Interns - HTLN

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This is a modification to add additional funding to P16AC01178 with American Conservation Experience (ACE).  The objectives of this agreement are to: 1) engage youth for the benefit of NPS park natural resources through scientific inquiry and discovery while providing youth unique educational and professional opportunities in the field of natural resources management; 2) monitor “vital signs” of ecosystem health in 15 National Park units with assistance from the American Conservation Experience thereby enhancing science-based natural resource stewardship to protect and conserve natural resources; 3) facilitate an awareness of resource conservation to youth and the public; 4) support opportunities for youth to learn about the environment by spending time working on projects in National Parks. The project engages recipients, partners, communities, and/or visitors in shared environmental stewardship. The project motivates its youth participants to become involved in the natural, cultural and /or historical resource protection of their communities and beyond. Youth gain “real world” or hands-on experience outside of the classroom of natural, cultural and/or historical resource projects. The scientific community and/or researchers external to NPS gains by new knowledge provided through research and related results dissemination of natural, cultural and/or historical resource information. The project assists in the creation, promotion, facilitation, and/or improvement of the public’s understanding of natural, cultural, historic, recreational and other aspects of areas such as ecological conservation areas, and state and local parks. The Heartland Network requires assistance with the implementation of several long-term monitoring protocols including vegetation, invasive species, breeding birds, fish, and populations of rare plants. Interns will also assist with monitoring the effects of prescribed fire. The ACE interns will assist HTLN scientists in accomplishing a variety of field-oriented ecological inventory and monitoring projects. These projects include: (1) Annual monitoring of rare plant populations at Wilson’s Creek National Battlefield (NB) and Pipestone National Monument (NM); (2) Vegetation community monitoring and invasive plant monitoring; (3) Deer spotlight surveys at Wilson’s Creek NB, Pea Ridge National Military Park (NMP), and Arkansas Post NM (4) Assessing bird habitat as part of breeding bird monitoring. Interns will also assist with monitoring related office work, including: (1) Entering monitoring data and species occurrence information into databases and spreadsheets, using Microsoft Access and Excel (2) Collect and process plant specimens for an in-house herbarium (3) Conducting background research to support data analysis and reporting (4) Data summary and report writing.  Additional duties may include to assist with invasive plant management using mechanical and chemical applications.

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