In the spring of 2007, we launched the pilot program for Partners in the Parks at Bryce Canyon National Park in southern Utah. We welcomed honors students from all over the country to spend five days in the forests and canyons of this fantastic park. Participants hiked canyons with geologists, explored the sound scapes of the front country with an environmental psychologist, backpacked through the backcountry with a librarian, a fiction writer, and an outdoor recreation professor.

Bryce Canyon Project participants included honors studetns from: Long Island University, Northeastern, Quinnipiac University, Lamar University, Utah State, and Southern Utah University (SUU). The program was led by SUU Honors Director Professor Matt Nickerson and English Professor Dr. Todd Petersen. Two professors from Long Island University also joined us for the adventure.

Rangers at the park found Partners in the Parks students to be bright and invigorating. They welcomed us into their seasonal staff training sessions for the second half of the program and included us in their important archaeological and endangered species research.

A couple program participants ran across a black bear while in the back country, which they confirmed with a photograph. Once they heard about the sighting, park staff flooded to our base camp. No one had seen a black bear in as long as anyone at the park could remember, and they had no photographs of black bears in the park archives.

Project Archives :: | Bryce 2007 | Bryce 2008 |