ANNOUNCING PARK BREAK 2012
An all-expenses-paid seminar for grad students aiming at a career in protected area management, research, or education
Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, Pennsylvania • March 19–23, 2012
Application deadline: January 20, 2012

Park Break is an all-expenses-paid, park-based field seminar for graduate students contemplating a career in park and land-use management or related research and education fields. Park Break puts you in a national park unit for a week’s worth of field and classroom activities in close collaboration with scientists and scholars, managers and administrators, and partner organizations.  As a member of small team of grad students, you will work on a specific topic or project of relevance to the park.

The next Park Break session will be held March 19–23, 2012, at Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area in Pennsylvania. The 2012 Park Break project will be the creation of a curriculum on sustainable living, aimed at 8th-grade students, to be used at the Pocono Environmental Education Center.  The Park Break team will draw on the context of several energy projects that are affecting or could affect the park, such as natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation north of the park, or the proposal for a powerline that would cross the park.  

The primary goal of Park Break is to let promising graduate students experience the challenges of managing a protected area. Through instruction from and dialogue with resource managers, researchers, administrators, interpreters, and other professionals, Park Break participants will begin to understand the complexity of protected area research and management. This unique program is not offered anywhere else, as it focuses on scientific and intellectual inquiry at the graduate level  specifically related to parks, other protected natural areas, and cultural sites.

Applications for the 2012 Park Break program are being accepted through January 20.  For more information, go to

http://www.georgewright.org/parkbreak

Park Break is a collaborative program of the US Geological Survey, US National Park Service, Pocono Environmental Education Center, and George Wright Society.  If you have any questions, contact the GWS at info@georgewright.org.