UA News

Students from the UA School of Natural Resources not only placed 6th overall in a recent competition, some landed jobs as well.

Students from The University of Arizona's School of Natural Resources not only placed sixth overall in a recent competition, some landed career jobs as well.

Nine members of Tierra Seca, the UA student chapter of the Society for Range Management, or SRM, attended the society's 62nd annual meeting in Albuquerque, New Mexico in February. The organization sponsors professional opportunities for students, including competitions and on-the-spot job interviews.

Seven of the students participated in the Undergraduate Range Management Exam, known as URME, where they competed against 173 students from 22 universities from across North America. Coached by Larry Howery, UA extension specialist and professor of natural resources, the group included Ashley Shepherd, Andy Habgood, Teressa Van Diest, Steve Bluemer, John Hall, Brandon Bishop and April Barron.

The team placed sixth overall, with Teressa Van Diest placing second individually. Ashley Shepherd placed 19th and John Hall placed 29th, helping the team secure the sixth place finish. Eva Osmer, a rangeland ecology and management graduate student, presented a poster on her graduate research and competed in the graduate poster competition.

As a result of her high placement on the test, Van Diest is one step closer to becoming a Certified Rangeland Management Professional, which also requires completion of the natural resources degree and five years of related work experience.

In addition to their success in the URME competition, six students were offered jobs at the SRM's On-the-Spot Hiring Job Fair. All are receiving bachelor's degrees except Osmer, who is completing a master's degree. The jobs - all full time positions - will begin in May 2009:

Habgood secured a student cooperative education program position with the U.S. Forest Service in Arizona's Coronado National Forest. He will be hired as a student and work 360 hours over the next year-and-a-half, and be hired full time upon graduation.

Bluemer and Osmer accepted positions as rangeland management specialists with the U.S. Forest Service in the Douglas District of the Coronado National Forest.

Hall was hired as a rangeland management specialist with the Bureau of Land Management in Yuma, Ariz.

April Barron received a position as a rangeland management specialist with the U.S. Forest Service in the Mammoth Lakes District, Inyo National Forest, Calif.

Brandon accepted a position as a rangeland management specialist with the United States Department of Agriculture's Natural Resource Conservation Service in New Mexico.

The students raised funds for their travel through bake sales, shirt sales and a contract for rock dam construction on the Santa Rita Experimental Range. They also obtained donations from the CALS Alumni Association, the Arizona Section of the Society for Range Management and a variety of private individuals.

"Everyone who wanted a job got one," said Mitch McClaran, professor of range management and Tierra Seca advisor. He noted that the SRM has offered the written exam for more than 25 years and has invited employers to recruit at their national meeting for at least the past decade. For five years the employers have come authorized to make job offers directly at the meeting.

"They spend a day discussing opportunities with prospective employees, another day interviewing candidates, and then make job offers," McClaran said. "The students have 12 hours to accept before the job is offered to someone else."

At next year's meeting in Denver, the recruiters will include the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service and the Nature Conservancy, in addition to the BLM, U.S. Forest Service and the Natural Resource Conservation Service.

"We're producing graduates who are in demand, and this meeting is a vehicle that helps satisfy students' career goals," McClaran said. "The field has more jobs than we have students."