New River Conservancy nominated as AmeriCorps NCCC ‘Partner of the Year’

AmeriCorps Team Grizzly7 works in Pulaski to clean up a tire dump along a stream, establish a rain water garden, and work with a daycare at Calfee plant trees, all of which helps protect and preserve the New River watershed.

 

For the second year consecutive year, New River Conservancy (NRC), along with Friends of Peak Creek, had the pleasure of hosting an AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC) team in the New River Valley, where they stayed in Pulaski, VA and, in part, did work on Peak Creek, clean ups and plantings and invasive plant removal. The team was named Grizzly 7. AmeriCorps NCCC is a federal program that provides 18- 24 year olds with an opportunity for valuable life experience and skill development while helping communities.

In Pulaski, the Grizzly 7 team helped clean up a tire dump along a stream, established a rain water garden, and worked with a daycare at Calfee plant trees.

Jordan C. Plante, AmeriCorps NCCC Assistant Program Director informed NRC that before their graduation in June, Grizzly 7 nominated New River Conservancy for Partner of the Year. Though another partner organization was ultimately chosen for the recognition, NRC was “right there in the mix.”         Plante continued “Thank you for doing a phenomenal job hosting Grizzly 7, investing in them as a team and individuals, and shaping such a meaningful service experience for them.” Plante also shared the nomination, which follows in part:

New River Conservancy(NRC) is an environmental conservation program located in southwest Virginia that Grizzly 7 worked with during part of our round 3 project. I believe that in terms of clear communication with the team, education on the value of the work we performed and on the local environment, and availability to help members with questions about future LAA plans, our sponsors with NRC have exceeded any other sponsor G7 has worked with as well as any that I’ve heard about from other teams.

Our supervisors had clear planning for the work we accomplished, which was accessible to the entire team through a google drive which was updated to reflect any changes that happened during the round. In addition, weekly and daily check in’s with both myself and the volunteers kept everyone in the loop about what the team was enjoying and what the team struggled with.

The service-learning they organized for us were incredibly rewarding for the team, including things like visiting an endangered river fish with state biologists, meeting a helitack fire crew to sit in the helicopter and answer questions about a career in wildland firefighting, and touring a freshwater mussel lab on the Virginia Tech campus to learn about the impacts mussels have on the river. They prepared presentations for the team for rainy days as an alternate task and broke up long days with plant identification activities.

 

Our direct supervisors, Sydney and Celia, are both NCCC alumni who served on a fire team in 2021. They had worked with multiple NCCC teams before us and were constantly in communication with updates to the schedule and for what to expect from the work. One thing they focused on was explaining the benefit we would receive from any kind of work we did to highlight the importance of the conservation work to the volunteers. The work we did often varied by day, keeping things interesting and exciting, and the education and service-learning opportunities they found for the team were due to their personal connections to amazing conservationists.

New River Conservancy is honored to be nominated, and is grateful to have incredible partners like Friends of Peak Creek, as well as staff such as Sydney Haney and Celia White, NRC Clean Up Coordinators in the New River Valley. The New River Conservancy is a 501C(3) non- profit organization whose mission for over 50 years has been to protect the waters, woodlands and wildlife of the New River watershed. All donations are tax deductible. For more information, please visit newriverconservancy.org

 

 

Cutline: AmeriCorps Team Grizzly7 works in Pulaski to clean up a tire dump along a stream, establish a rain water garden, and work with a daycare at Calfee plant trees, all of which helps protect and preserve the New River watershed.