Title: ALCC Canyons of the Ancients National Monument - Individual Placement

Stipend: $530/week (+ Education Award)

Dates: open until filled

Term: 17 weeks - Full time ideally in Spring or Summer (willing to work with selected individual's schedule)

Reports To: Bureau of Land Management, Canyon of The Ancients National Monument

Open Positions: 1 Individual Placement

Housing: On-site housing offered

Location: Dolores, CO 81323

Status: 450-hour AmeriCorps Service Term

Benefits: AmeriCorps Education Award of $1,718.25 after successful completion of service term. Housing is available on site at Canyon of the Ancients National Monument.

Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps’ Mission

It is the mission of the Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps to lead our nations back to cultural and ecological well being. The Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps has offices in Acoma, Albuquerque, Gallup, Zuni, and Hopi. Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps serves local Indigenous communities in the regions we operate. This program is available to all, without regard to race, color, national origin, gender, age, religion, sexual orientation, disability, gender identity or expression, political affiliation, marital or parental status, genetic information, and military service. Where a significant portion of the population eligible to be served needs services or information in a language other than English, the recipient shall take reasonable steps to provide written material of the type ordinarily available to the public in appropriate languages.

Bureau Of Land Management Mission

The Bureau of Land Management's mission is to sustain the health, diversity, and productivity of public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.

Program Overview:

Canyons of the Ancients National Monument (the Monument) encompasses 176,000 acres of federal land administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The Monument is located in the Four Corners region of southwestern Colorado, about 50 miles west of Durango, 10 miles west of Cortez and 12 miles west of Mesa Verde National Park. The Monument was designated on June 9, 2000 by Presidential Proclamation to protect cultural and natural resources on a landscape scale.

The Monument contains the highest known archaeological site density in the United States, with rich, well-preserved evidence of native cultures. The archeological record etched into this landscape is much more than isolated islands of architecture. This cultural landscape contains more than 6,355 recorded sites reflect all the physical components of past human life: villages, field houses, check dams, reservoirs, great kivas, cliff dwellings, shrines, sacred springs, agricultural fields, petroglyphs and sweat lodges. Some areas have more than 100 sites per square mile. The number of sites is estimated to be up to 30,000.

The Monument has been used or inhabited by humans, including the Northern Ancestral Puebloan culture (or Anasazi), for 10,000 years, and continues to be a landscape used by humans today. Historic uses of the Monument include recreation, hunting, livestock grazing and energy development.

Canyons of the Ancients National Monument is seeking an energetic individual to be placed at the Visitor Center and Museum located in Dolores, CO. Canyons of the Ancients National Monument Education Program links the preservation to visitor's backyards and communities. On a yearly basis, approximately 30,000 people visit the Monument and Museum to learn more about the human history of the southwest.

Interns will gain experience in visitor services and interpretation of cultural resources to visitors at the museum and monument. The intern will get hands-on experience in conducting curriculum-based field trip programs for school groups and developing hands-on interpretive programs on-site for visitors at the museum. Additionally, the intern will work with curation staff who help protect almost 4 million artifacts in the curation facility on site at the museum. There will also be opportunities to shadow field archaeologists during site-visits to important sensitive archaeology sites.

Essential functions and responsibilities:

• Observe and Shadow Education, Volunteer Stewardship, and Interpretive Programs
  • Shadow subject matter experts in different Education and Stewardship roles at CANM: Visitor Services, Recreation Staff, BLM Educators and partners.
  • Learn education programs and assist staff members in program delivery, if programs are being conducted.
  • Develop one interpretive/education program or resource, with the goal to present weekly at museum to visiting guests or through a digital platform, if more appropriate. Projects could include: updating artifacts in the gallery to a digital model; updating the CANM Agents of Discovery App to include a hands-on gallery tour inside the museum.
  • Participate in project planning and project execution for stewardship programs on the monument or at the VC. This could include assisting staff with a National Public Lands Day event.
• Observe and Shadow Visitor Services/Front Desk Support
  • Assist Visitor Services Staff in orienting visitors to museum exhibits, outside trails, onsite pueblos, playing orientation videos, and answering general questions. Depending on COVID conditions, what this ultimately looks like could vary widely.
  • Assist with general maintenance of main gallery exhibits and providing materials to visitors.
  • Shadow recreation staff and specialists to learn more about monument activities and orientation.
• Shadow Curation and Archaeology Staff
  • Shadow curation staff to learn more about history and research on the monument.
  • Shadow Museum Specialists to learn more about curation/archives/artifacts/research at Museum and in Collections. Depending on interest and skill sets, work with curation staff on curation projects.
  • Shadow archaeologist on visits to public pueblo sites on monument to learn about research, preservation and stabilization projects.
  • Shadow Supervisory Curator to learn more about tribal consultation and NAGPRA at CANM

Required Skills

General Qualifications:

Background or interest in education, history, archaeology cultural resources or visitor services and the comfort level to talk and present to the public and share their tribal perspective.

The successful applicant must be self-motivated and able to work independently with limited supervision after the initial training period. The applicant must be able to maneuver and operate in a mixture of office and field work. This can include long periods of standing or walking on rough, uneven ground, bending, crouching, and stooping. Also it is important that this person possess a good attitude and willingness to learn. Flexibility and understanding as COVID conditions could shift some intern duties. Prior to starting this, position a government security background clearance will be required.

Requirements:

• Age 18-30 years
• U.S. Citizenship
  • Permanent Resident Card, INS form I-551
  • Alien Registration Card, INS form I-551
  • A passport indicating that the INS has approved it as temporary evidence of lawful admission for permanent residence
  • A departure record ( INS 194) indication that the INS has approved it as temporary evidence of lawful admission for permanent residence

Housing will be available to the selected candidate.

Apply Now!

To apply, please submit an updated resume and letter of interest along with the online application.

Contact Kiana Etsate-Gashytewa at kiana@conservationlegacy.org with any questions.

Required Experience

General Qualifications:

Background or interest in education, history, archaeology cultural resources or visitor services and the comfort level to talk and present to the public and share their tribal perspective.

The successful applicant must be self-motivated and able to work independently with limited supervision after the initial training period. The applicant must be able to maneuver and operate in a mixture of office and field work. This can include long periods of standing or walking on rough, uneven ground, bending, crouching, and stooping. Also it is important that this person possess a good attitude and willingness to learn. Flexibility and understanding as COVID conditions could shift some intern duties. Prior to starting this, position a government security background clearance will be required.

Requirements:

• Age 18-30 years
• U.S. Citizenship
  • Permanent Resident Card, INS form I-551
  • Alien Registration Card, INS form I-551
  • A passport indicating that the INS has approved it as temporary evidence of lawful admission for permanent residence
  • A departure record ( INS 194) indication that the INS has approved it as temporary evidence of lawful admission for permanent residence

Housing will be available to the selected candidate.

Apply Now!

To apply, please submit an updated resume and letter of interest along with the online application.

Contact Kiana Etsate-Gashytewa at kiana@conservationlegacy.org with any questions.