For students interested in landing a plum environment-focused job after graduation, having some professional experience on their resumé can go a long way. But how can a full-time student manage to fit that in alongside a full schedule of classes? Enter the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS)’s Environmental Stewardship and Restoration class.
Once enrolled in this class, students are matched with a prominent Vermont conservation organization, where they’re assigned to a dynamic internship project centered around nature resource management—think managing a trail camera for Vermont Fish and Wildlife or designing a program for the Bristol Trail Network to introduce birding to young people.
“This hands-on experience is crucial because it helps define for our students what they could do with their degrees and where their preferences lie,” says Ariana Cano, Ph.D., faculty mentor for the Environmental Stewardship class. “It also helps them develop their own network with local community members and allows them to work alongside professionals who have already paved the way.” And while they’re gaining this professional experience, students are also earning credit toward their degree.
The Environmental Stewardship class is offered through CAS’s (COP), a collection of hands-on, internship-focused classes open to students of all majors. Every COP class offers opportunities for students to make significant contributions to their communities through work as interns on projects for external, service-oriented organizations.
The Environmental Stewardship class in particular supports ¶¶Ňő̽̽’s Planetary Health Initiative, which explores the connection between human well-being and the health of the environment and inspires action that promotes both a thriving planet and healthy people. The class aligns beautifully with the initiative’s goals to increase research, expand educational programming, support policy, and engage with communities.
We asked a few Environmental Stewardship students to share their experiences being part of this movement to restore the environment and create a brighter future for our communities. Turns out, the work they completed provided each one with benefits that went way beyond just boosting their resumés.
Brooke George
Brooke George, a senior majoring in environmental studies, says she was drawn to the Stewardship class out of a desire to involve herself in work within the local community. She interned with the Intervale Conservation Nursery, a nonprofit in Burlington that grows native trees and shrubs for use in conservation and restoration projects across the state, primarily in wetland areas near rivers and streams.
George and two other interns served as nursery assistants. Beginning in February, they worked in the fields to take hardwood cuttings that were then propagated in the greenhouse and transplanted back out into the fields in the warmer months. George also helped harvest and ship the bareroot trees and shrubs that had grown tall enough to sell.
“I learned copious amounts about the various species grown at the nursery and their purposes and roles in the world of restoration ecology and climate resilience,” George says. “Plus, I gained a better understanding of the cyclical nature of these operations.” The most valuable lesson she received, though, was the importance of relationship building and collaboration. “It’s amazing how working alongside people who all feel as though they have something to learn from each other can create an environment rich with curiosity, purpose, and drive,” she says.
Nico Hochanadel
A forestry major in the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, sophomore Nico Hochanadel says he was drawn to the Stewardship class for the real-world experience that it offered. “I will be able to use this internship in the future as proof of my knowledge and abilities,” he says.
Hochanadel interned for the Stowe Electric Department (SED), a public utility located in Moscow, Vermont that serves the greater Stowe area. “SED did a restoration project on a section of stream bank on their property,” he says. “They wanted to use themselves as an example for other utilities hoping to complete similar projects.” As part of his internship, Hochanadel wrote a document about reducing the barriers to small-scale ecological restoration.
He learned a bit about himself along the way, too, including that he prefers hands-on restoration work to doing research on the computer. “It has been awesome to experience an internship so early in my life,” Hochanadel says. “Hopefully it will help me to adjust a bit more quickly to whatever I do next.”
Louisa Blakely
Junior Louisa Blakely interned for the City of Winooski as a water wildlife intern, gathering data about beaver dam dimensions and changes, tracking an invasive reed grass called phragmites, organizing data, and researching the role beavers play in ecosystems. Each week, she took photos of the progression of a beaver dam and the surrounding phragmites and then assessed how they might impact the community.
Blakely was drawn to the Stewardship class because she wanted to gain hands-on experience with a focus on the environment. “I’m an anthropology major with an interest in the natural world, but I don’t have direct access to natural resource classes,” she says. “This class was perfect since it’s part of CAS and allowed me to explore the world of environmental jobs.”
What stood out the most for her was how complex the career path can be. “I appreciated the guest speakers who came into the class—they eased my mind,” she says. “I don’t know specifically what I want to do with my life yet, and having the speakers talk about their own nonlinear stories was reassuring.”
Asa Rexford
A junior majoring in environmental science, Asa Rexford did an internship with the Bristol Trail Network, working to clean their trails for spring and summer use. “I also asked by the town’s recreation director to create a welcome sheet for people using mountain bikes from the Bristol Bike Library,” he says. He researched the bikes available for people to borrow and created an information sheet that recommends areas to ride based on skill level.
Rexford took the Stewardship class because it was an opportunity to receive credits toward his degree in a non-traditional way. To his delight, he had the opportunity to develop connections with people whose careers allow them to be outside, supporting recreation—something he’s very interested in. “It stood out to me how much work those people put in, and you can tell that it has really paid off in their town,” he says. “It was cool to see the direct impacts of jobs like that and how my own work added to it.”
Having an experience like this showed Rexford that he wants to focus more on the science aspects of the environmental sector. “This experience goes beyond graduation, too, by teaching you how to connect and communicate with people across fields.”