Amanda Curry - Winner of National Earth Team Individual Volunteer Award
Amanda Curry was recognized for her outstanding volunteer service to New Jersey NRCS Earth Team in FY2014 with the National Earth Team Individual Volunteer Award. NRCS Biologist Evan Madlinger and District Conservationist Chad Cherefko nominated her.
Amanda Curry of Hillsborough, NJ, is a student at Florida State University, majoring in Environmental Science. For approximately 14 weeks in the summer of 2014, Amanda worked 25-35 hours a week (total of 354 hours) as a volunteer, primarily for the Frenchtown Field Office. She assisted with a diverse range of conservation work for four additional offices in New Jersey (Hackettstown, Woodstown, Vineland and the State Office).
Amanda was jointly supervised by Biologist Evan Madlinger and Chad Cherfko, District Conservationist, Frenchtown. Amanda showed amazing dedication throughout the summer. She survived many long, hot days in the field, evaluating private lands for wildlife habitat, wetland restoration, stream enhancement, and agronomic conservation practices. She also assisted in surveying and designing conservation practices with our engineers and field staff. In addition, Amanda got involved with soil science. During her time spent in the field with our Soil Scientist Fred Schoenagle, Amanda learned how soils can drive restoration efforts or define legal wetlands. She participated in wildlife habitat planning, including mist netting and the banding of Goldenwinged warblers (federally petitioned species for listing) and evaluating bog turtle habitat (federally threatened species).
Not all her time was spent in the field, though. Amanda also became proficient in creating aerial, wetland, and topographic maps using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and our Customer Toolkit Program software. This work helped our field staff immensely during our busy Farm Bill program contracting time. She also helped our Program Assistant Shirley Sakos accomplish the extensive job of reorganizing our filing system in the office.
Amanda trudged through swamps, hiked up steep forested slopes, got rained on, and got back to the office at 7:00 pm. She was asked to come in once at 5:00 am, was constantly pulling off ticks, and ran into a six foot black rat snake! And the office work she did offered its own challenges, i.e., less excitement, no glamour, computer software frustrations, potential boredom, but was and is just as important to the overall mission of helping people help the land. Amanda dealt with all of these challenges while not earning a paycheck, and she never complained.
