Williams & Ryan 1

Environmental
Youths of
America

Williams & Ryan 2

Table of Contents
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Positon
History of the Campaign
Evolution of the Conservation Movement
Jobs in National Parks
Action Plan

Daniel Williams and Brandon Ryan

Mr. Diehl

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3
4
6
9

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C501 Advanced Environmental Science
25 April 2016
Environmental Campaign Project
Environmental Youths of America
Position
Our goal is to inspire our youth to go out and protect our parks and raise awareness to
those who don't know about problems in our national parks. We want to raise awareness of the
amount of workers that are in our parks. Our hope is that they gain passion from our energy and
information that they go out and potentially work and protect the parks we love today from
damage
History of the Campaign
National parks and monuments were monitored by the Department of Interior and a few
people felt it wasn't good enough. Stephen Mather and Horace McFarland ran a campaign for
this Department for a better independent agency to watch over these important lands. The two
wrote numerous articles that praised the parks they loved and it ultimately led to the creation of
the National Park Service on August 25, 1916 signed by President Woodrow Wilson. The NPS
had a mission and it was to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and wildlife
therein, and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will
leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations. This mission and service still
holds to this day. Stephen Mather became the first director of the NPS. Mather was a wealthy
businessman as well as a secretary for the Department of Interior. He had always had park
concerns. After the creation of the NPS he still continued to promote ideas and make the parks
more popular to people. He even donated money from his own pocket.

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After many years a different organization was formed for protecting our national parks in
a different way. In 1953 the Student Conservation Association was founded by Liz Putnam. She
was only 20 years old when it was founded but before then she was interested in the National
Park Service. She wanted to benefit the students, parks, visitors, and officials. It is still around
today with over 75,000 participants. The SCA's mission is to build the next generation of
conservation leaders and inspire lifelong stewardship of the environment and communities by
engaging young people in hands-on service to the land. Their continuing goal is to create leaders
for the environment: all in a day's work.

Samuel Mather
Evolution of the Conservation Movement
The Evolution of the Conservation Movement started in 1890 and ended in 1920. This
movement preserved and protected America's wildlife, lands, and our natural resources. It also
did a lot more like set new laws. It later led to the development of national parks; flood control;
reforestation; and the preservation of minerals, soil, water, and wildlife resources. The
Progressive era around this time set laws which in the end result had people who supported
environmental protection. Nature lovers and conservationists during this era convinced people
the importance of protecting the environment. They wanted to be able to do activities in the park
so they went out and started camping, hiking, and bird watching because of the baby boom.

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Cities were becoming more crowded and people needed an escape to get away. There was too
much going on at the time and what way to get away than to go to parks like Yosemite and
Yellowstone which were later formed. At first there weren't many explorers in these parks but
when people brought back these stunning photos of the views they became more and more
popular.

Yosemite Valley
The way people saw these lands before the movement began was the few people that
were there on the land felt the need to kill any animal they were threatened by. If they needed
more farmland then they would cut down the land to farm. After all, man ruled the land and
every living organism below it was just living under us. They didn't matter. The movement was
created because of economic and social factors. Local and national groups helped to promote the
protection of the natural resources. The first thing anyone did was teach school children about
birds in a contest in hopes that the knowledge would stick with them.
No man or president could have done more than President Theodore Roosevelt. He was
an outdoorsman and hunter. He played a crucial role in the movement and it would be nothing
without his help. The first thing he did was establish a federal bird refuge off of Florida to protect
the last of the brown pelicans. He went on to establish 51 more bird reservations in the
conservation movement. Conservation was his main concern after becoming president so he
created the United States Forest Service where he established 150 national forests, 4 national
game preserves, 5 national parks, and 18 national monuments. He also protected about 230

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million acres of public land. There were many other sites later on during his presidency. There
were around 35 more national parks created and he helped create 23 of those. It's quite obvious
that without Teddy and the laws he helped put in place along with other leaders of the
conservation movement then the protection of our resources and our beautiful land would not be
around. The resources will continue to be protected and new laws will continue to be pushed into
congress by new leaders of America to watch over what land we have left and the views we
have.

Jobs in National Parks

It is harder for people to find jobs in parks these days. When people do get a job in a
park, they are assigned to an area but not in the park itself. They are mainly assigned to an office
job for the park. You would think that it is easy to get a job in a national park but it fact it is hard.
The National Park Service has funded 13,000 employees nationwide. They have full time and
part time employees in many fields. Some of the jobs are not filled and are only filled by
seasonal employees.The NPS fills jobs in many fields, including interpretation, maintenance,
administration, resources management, education, dispatch communications, and law
enforcement. Some jobs will focus on the public and education. It will require some to reach out
to schools and educate them on the parks which do protect the park in a way and raise awareness
but it's not enough. There aren't enough people that want to work in parks because they don't get

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to choose the area to work in. They are assigned an area which turns most people away because
they have a passion for a specific thing. Some want to protect wildlife and be a park
ranger/official but they might not be one because the NPS might need people in maintenance.
The NPS needs to change it so that anyone can choose the field to work in because if that
happens then more people will work for the parks and the parks will be saved. There will be
more eyes watching over the lands. The volunteer program at Yosemite is like the job of an
employee except there is no salary. They expect the same out of each volunteer as they would
their own employee. They hold meetings and expect too much out of their volunteers. It's
understandable to hold meetings but it's taken too far for a group of volunteers. This is one
reason why people don't volunteer is because it's too big of a commitment and they have trouble
fitting it into their schedule, but it works well with the younger generation. Unlike Yosemite
there is Yellowstone where you can choose your field.
Yellowstone has different fields that you can go into and better ones to protect it. It has
support service, security, transportation, park personnel, and maintenance to protect the parks.
They do everything they can to keep the wildlife, resources, and plants around. They hire about
100 people in the summer and around 90 of them are filled. Some have to be turned down for
certain reasons because of health. More people should apply for these jobs for better workers.
What they do is attract visitors from all over along with Yosemite. Both of these parks are great
parks. The only difference is that in Yosemite the NPS won't let a person go into a specific area.
The passion people have is thrown off the cliff with this rule and therefore damages part of
Yosemite. They both attract visitors from around the world and are the most famous national
parks in the United States. They started out as one of the fewest visiting parks and are now two
of the most visited parks in the U.S. They are also very well protected. They natural beauty is

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still there and each visitor is in awe at what they see. You can't find that in every park. More
parks need to be like these. There are too many people going out and educating others on the
problems of our environment and wildlife but not enough people actually going out to do it.
More change needs to be done but its up to the people. Yellowstone and Yosemite are the best
examples.

Graph of total visitors in Yosemite from 1905-2015

Average visit per month in Yellowstone from 1979-2012

Action Plan

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The Environmental Youths of America can only hope that our younger generation
understands that we aren't the only living organisms on this planet. There are parks that many
people love and there are people destroying it. It's hard to save but with the help of volunteers we
can save it together. The natural beauty is being taken away. Our hope is that the younger
generation is aware as they move on through school and they start to learn about global warming
that it will only get worse and that it will effect numerous species and they will need saving and
we have to save them. It is also important that the younger generation start volunteering at an
early age because it they will gain a passion for it. It has to start with the help of the parents. We
need their help too and encourage their children to volunteer in youth programs. It is important
for the change if our environment to be made and for us to be prepared because it will only get
worse from here. One way to get them more involved is by school based programs in elementary
with definitive exposure, law, defense, and conservation in biology. Other activities to get them
motivated like hiking, camping, plating trees, and playing outdoor games will get them to
volunteer. There are many programs that are doing what they can to help save the environment
we live in such as Green Peace, Arbor Day Foundation, World Wildlife Fund, Defenders of
Wildlife, care.org, and Kay Humane Society. All of these are similar to the Student Conservation
Association and they have programs trying to create leaders in America. There needs to be more
publicity with these organizations so more people are aware. There could be more available,
more donations, and more publicity. It could get the younger generation up and moving.

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Works Cited
Budniak, Michael. Interview. 21 Apr. 2015.
"Conservation Movement." New Hampshire Public Television. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2016.
"Creating Leaders for the Environment: All in a Day's Work." The Student Conservation
Association. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2016.
"Job Listings | Yellowstone National Park Lodges, Wyoming."Yellowstone National Park Lodges
Wyoming. N.p., 10 Oct. 2014. Web. 21 Apr. 2016.
"The Evolution of the Conservation Movement, 1850-1920History."History. N.p., n.d. Web. 20
Apr. 2016.
"Theodore Roosevelt Island." United States National Park Service. 21 Apr. 2016. Web.
United States National Park Service. "National Park Service Employment." National Parks
Service. U.S. Department of the Interior, n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2016.
United States National Park Service. "National Park Service History: Directors of National Park
Service." National Parks Service. U.S. Department of the Interior. n.d. Web. 20 Apr.
2016.
United States National Park Service. "Theodore Roosevelt and Conservation." National Parks
Service. U.S. Department of the Interior. n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2016.
"Yosemite National Park." United States Park Service. Apr. 2015. Web. 21 Apr. 2015.