Updates & Stories

After 38 days in Saipan, a four-member Conservation Corps disaster response crew returns home Friday, October 9. Serving with Texas Conservation… Read More

There is something about that little bubbling noise of a creek that brings my entire life into perspective. The water is carefree. It has no recollection of itself nor does it worry about others. All it knows is to flow with the constant pull of gravity downstream. But if I were a creek, I would hope to flow to the ocean. I want to be a part of something greater than myself.  Read More

When I lifted my head up I was alone. Burgundy and purple seed heads brushed against my face and shoulders. The sound of grass shaking in the wind washed all around the deeply rolling hills and over the high ridges that surrounded me. Inside that glacial kettle, a bowl of land ringed by undulating hills and ridges, my world had compressed. A pair of hawks banked along the ridges, crying out into the wind, certain of their place on this back forty. Alone, surrounded by a virgin tallgrass prairie, steeped in the purples, blues and gold of fall, I was transported to a Minnesota that once was, and perhaps to a future that might be again. Read More

Our crew is based about 30 minutes south of the Twin Cities in Shakopee, Minn. We’re what’s known as a “satellite crew”— a crew based out of a host shop away from Corps headquarters in Saint Paul. With five crews based in the capital city and three out of Three Rivers Park District, that leaves the Anoka and Shakopee crews as true satellites. As it turns out, I had no idea we were lonely outsiders until about halfway through our term. Read More

Thank you to our volunteers who came out to make 72 dozen seed bombs in less than an hour! Read More

7:00 AM: The day starts with getting the truck from the “bull pen”, a fenced area where all the DNR and Corps trucks are housed. Our crew leader Steve checks his email or calls our project host to see what we are doing, and today we are heading up to Wild River State Park to work on woody invasives. Read More

In the early morning hours of September 2, a four-person crew boarded a plane for Saipan, where Typhoon Soudelor made landfall on August 2 before heading to Taiwan, China and Japan’s Ryukuy Islands. During its 30-day deployment, the crew will set up a Volunteer Reception Center (VRC) to help coordinate and manage volunteers from multiple agencies and community groups. Read More

This summer, the Corps joined forces with Superior National Forest (SNF) to hire and train 12 young adult corps members through the Faces of Tomorrow initiative, which provides intensive training and work experience to under-represented individuals to help them move into full-time Forest Service conservation positions.  Read More

During 16 days in August, a six-person Conservation Corps crew stripped and restored church pews at the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial in Indiana, which is operated and maintained by the National Park Service.  Read More

For a third consecutive year, Summer Youth Corps crews helped plant trees at Voyageur’s National Park in International Falls, in collaboration with the Rainy Lake Sportfishing Club, Koochiching Soil & Water Conservation District and the National Parks Conservation Association.  Read More