Conservation Stewardship Internship

This project with Conservation Corps of Minnesota and Iowa (CCMI) will allow youth to explore careers in conservation and recreation management. An individual youth placement will assist in serving visitors of Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge through interpretation, visual communications, special events, trail maintenance and quality customer service. Substantial involvement on the part of the Service is anticipated for the successful completion of the activities to be funded. In particular, the Service will be responsible for the following: selecting youth hires for this project, directing the work of youth hire placements, and reporting performance evaluations to CCMI. This is a notice of intent to award a single source cooperative to the CCMI under justification 505DM 2.14.B 1 & 4. CCIM is a nonprofit organization which has youth in place specifically for working on public lands. They have a successful track record of assigning appropriate personnel to outreach positions. CCMI's area of work consists of Minnesota and Iowa, which covers a large number of Service field stations in the Midwest region. Competition for this award is not practical because CCMI provides training in the local area which other youth hire organizations do not provide. They also provide human resources and other assistance to youth hires.