MARK WAITE / PVT National Park Service employees Carrie Hearn and Jay Snow talk to students at the University of Nevada, Reno Cooperative Extension Service. Advertisement

Youths who envy rangers who get paid for leading tourists on interpretive talks in the national parks got some tips on how to apply for those jobs during a talk at the University of Nevada, Reno Cooperative Extension Service Monday.

Carrie Hearn, a National Park Service interpreter at Death Valley National Park had a love of the outdoors. Her advice to job applicants who want a career in the national parks: persistence.

"I was willing to not give up, which is the key, because if you're interested in working for the park service you have to consistently apply, apply, apply, and it gets very redundant and there's a lot of government paperwork, but don't give up," Hearn said.

Hearn started out as a volunteer at Manzanar National Historic Site on Highway 395 in the Eastern Sierra, where she hiked in the montains, saw bears and loved to fish. She then began working as an intern, giving living history tours at Scotty's Castle in Death Valley in 1930s attire.

That was spliced between working at Starbuck's, even working weekends as a sign spinner advertising homes for Realtors on the highway.

"I started getting my masters in education to be a history teacher. But I thought that I liked the outdoors quite a bit. I liked being in the classroom, but it wasn't really enough for me -- I wanted to be outside," Hearn said.

While studying to be a history teacher in graduate school, Hearns entered the Student Career Experience Program, a National Parks Service program providing formal periods of work and study while attending school. She can probably transfer to a NPS position when she gets her degree for a non-competitive job.

There's also the Student Temporary Employment Program, she said, six months of seasonal work where students merely turn in their transcripts, a resume and apply for a job.

"When you become a park ranger, it's usually not a permanent job from the beginning, it's seasonal, which is three to six months at a time. You could be at Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, then they can move you out to Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee," Hearn said.

"Eventually you'll get a permanent job which sometimes can take a year, it can take eight years. Then you're in that one park for one to three years at a time," she said.

Death Valley National Park is hiring eight students this summer for the Youth Conservation Corps, Hearn said. That program is for youths 15 to 18 years old and involves some hard, physical work.

Then there are ordinary volunteers, she said. Sometimes the park service will provide housing and a stipend for them.

"He's really done well," said NPS interpreter Jay Snow of a friend, "and you know what he was before he came into the park service? A plumber. He spent time and time and time and time in caves. He was educated about caves ... it led to him getting a job at Carlsbad Caverns."

Students in the audience had different ambitions. One wanted to get into archaeology. Hearn said if he got a bachelor's degree in archaeology he could get a job through SCEP in resource management.

Another student wanted to work with animals. Snow said there are bear management programs in the Sierra Nevada.

Hearn said interpreters who lead people on guided hikes are given radios, taught basic CPR, and first-aid. Law enforcement rangers use guns and Tasers, sometimes going on patrols in helicopters, she said.

Snow said it took his wife 10 years before she became a permanent parks service employee; it only took him six months. But Snow said he had military experience, several degrees, was well educated, volunteered for two seasons and worked for the Natural History Association.

The park employees gave out two Web sites: www.studentjobs.gov and www.usajobs.gov.

"It makes you proud to wear the uniform once you get the job because you feel like you earned it, being in school, being qualified, and it's all about persistence, not giving up," Hearn said.