I think @jnstuart had a good suggestion with summer technician positions, which gave me my start as well. They may not pay much and may require travel but a summer’s experience may indicate if that type of work is indeed something you want to pursue. For positions w government agencies (National Park Service, US Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, etc) you can go to USAJOBS and in the Keywords search bar type in ‘biologicial technician’ as a start to see what’s available - USAJOBS - The Federal Government’s official employment site
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My experience is there are tons of cultural resources being done all the time on parks and preserves before things like restoration projects. Going into that kind of work might work better with your education while also allowing you to work at the parks, keep you outside, gain experience with the natural ecology angle of things, and possibly allow for a lateral move to another sort of work at a park at some time, or a more full melding of the cultural and natural aspects of the work which the parks should be doing anyway.
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As I tell anyone starting out in a career in biology or any similar line of work, you are unlikely to get your dream job right away. You might never get the perfect job (those are rare) but the important thing is to gain experience, make connections with others, and build your resume with each job you take. With some jobs, the college degree is more important than the field of study you pursued. I learned new things and gained skills from each and every job I had, including those that were not really related to my interest in biology (e.g., a stint as a proofreader/technical writer, working on boring corporate documents). If you have a strong interest in the natural world, the hobbies you pursue on your own time – such as iNatting, which didn’t exist when I was fresh out of college – can provide experience and expertise that can help in your job search. Volunteering, such as helping a graduate student in their field research, helps you make connections and you become known to those who might be able to hire you for other work. Good luck.
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FWIW, I graduated in Anthropology as well (from another Massachussetts school!). I think it’s been really helpful in my various jobs counseling children, teaching, and now doing community work on iNat. If you want to be an interpretive naturalist and teach people, or do fieldwork in a place where you have to interface with people a lot, especially from cultures different from yours, I think having that background is an asset (although I don’t know if most employers would see it that way, unfortunately).
Like others have said, even if you can’t get a job right away, volunteering is a great alternative. You want to keep improving your skills and making connections in your field of interest.
(Finally, you can reply to multiple people in one post by selecting their text and quoting them.)
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I know a few naturalist who spend all day inside a nature center. They drive to the park in the morning and leave in the evening. They never get to enjoy the park itself unless they are out leading a group on a nature walk or event. Some do go out before and after work. So, try to get a job to support yourself, in general, and then enjoy your hobby/interest on your off time. There are a lot of volunteer opportunities in local, state and national parks. Some museums also have volunteers out in the field. The other option is to go back to school. You are certainly not the first person to go to school for something only to realize that you are interested in something else.
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I once did invasive plant removal at a preserve where the land steward – my supervisor – had majored in English. So it is possible to branch out from your degree.
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Not impossible, but you wont likely be able to dive into it right away. Most that I know who were able to make a living doing field work (which - is also a lot of lab/desk work) started in undergrad with internships, expanded that in grad school (most going for masters, some PhD, but PhD’s in my experience stay within university type systems) and that launches the job.
I don’t think anthropology is a bad degree that is unhelpful with what you want, and echo the thoughts about volunteering. There really just is not a lot of money in naturalist type fields; and to get a good job in it is moving around, networking, and pure luck. The more you volunteer in the areas you like, the more networking, the more chances of luck dropping something in your lap from someone you know or someone who knows someone you know.
Look at:
Nature conservancies
Land trusts
State parks
State forests
National parks/forests
Zoos / aquariums - lots are doing a lot of conservation work, this is one i haven’t seen mentioned, and anthropology may be seen more as ‘a good thing’ depending on what type of job exactly
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Thank you so much, Lynn! All very helpful advice.
I just might love that kind of work. Thank you!
Thank you for making me feel a bit better about the degree! Those all sounds like great places to gain experience and I’ll be sure to look into them some more.
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Yeah, that’s most likely what I’ll end up having to do—in response to pursuing iNat only as a hobby, volunteering, or going back to school. Certainly, there doesn’t seem to be much money in it anyway!
Ah, a fellow (and local) anthro fan…Howdy! I just may end up doing volunteer work, as you say. I know that anthropology has its strengths too, but I would be in a much better position now if I had selected something with a clearer career trajectory. But, hey, I’m sure I’ll figure things out eventually!
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My parents say the same things! And I know they (and you) are spot-on. I have made at least one connection with a graduate student via iNat, but was unable to catch the right specimen for him. Oh, well. Thanks!
I’ve applied! Thank you.
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Chris, I am not totally au fait with the situation in the US. Here in Australia there is certainly plenty of work for people skilled in flora and fauna ID. After working for years as a forest ranger from leaving high school, I finally obtained a Biology Degree from a small provincial university at the age of 40. Much of my course was actually lab based subjects but I did do ecology, botany and zoology with a geology elective. After working for government and as a contractor for a while I obtained work in the resources industry as an Ecologist. The work consisted of doing desktop and field surveys to identify potential threatened species, mapping ecosystem types, assessing potential environmental offsets and interpreting environmental legislation in order to advise project managers. The experience I gained working in the field and learning to identify species and ecosystem types I think were more valuable to my employers than my academic credentials. When I retired last month my annual salary was a little bit in excess of 100K US$. I enjoyed every day of that sort of work. Best of luck going forward!
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Hey Christopher! Like other people said in here, I use it as a sort of extension of my job. I’m a forest ranger and wildlife firefighter so I just bring my camera with me everywhere. Sorry this is not really an answer, just rambling . Hope you find a solution
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I have to push back against volunteering a little bit. While i don’t begrudge individuals for doing it, and it is the main path into the field, it ends up being very exclusionary, as only upper middle class or higher can reliably do so, and people in a lower social class or other marginalized group are disproportionately excluded. It’s also giving away work for free. I love being a field ecologist, but with hungry insects, scary humans, severe weather, unreliable field equipment, very long days, tons of travel, etc etc. it is work. I do prefer it over an office, and i think it attracts a lot of neurodivergent people who don’t do well in offices, like myself. But i think if we give away too much free work we do ourselves a disservice as well as others. Imagine ‘volunteering’ to work in a steel mill and you displace a paid employee. You wouldn’t have other steel mill employees or the union encouraging you to do this, to say the least.
This isn’t to say don’t do naturalizing on your own time, but rather that you should make sure to keep boundaries and do things you enjoy that aren’t displacing a paid person. iNat is absolutely perfect for this. It’s a place where you do consequential conservation work, but you aren’t displacing other jobs, and it’s fun and you choose when you want to do it. Likewise, volunteer to pull weeds at a local restoration site or if you have land you can control, replace lawns and landscaping with native plants and document what insects come. This will result in more benefit to conservation and human well being than competing over who can do the most unpaid ‘volunteering’ and temporary jobs in hopes of a permanent job with health insurance (if you are in the US that is the big issue, maybe different elsewhere). Also there is no guarantee you will ever be given that permanent job. People absolutely take advantage sometimes.
My advice is: if office jobs seem awful to you, there may be sensory or social issues for that and it is very valid. Prioritize not having an office job. I struggle horribly in office jobs and working from home has been a game changer for me to be able to do computer work. but i still need that outside time a lot too. However, you don’t need to prioritize getting paid (or not getting paid when you should) to ‘make a living as a naturalist’. You are more than what you ‘do’ to ‘earn money’ in the capitalist colonial system, and in the end the bees don’t care what your job is anyway.
Maybe an unpopular opinion, and i’m not gonna argue about it here, but wanted to provide this other view on the subject.
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I agree that overly volunteering is not the best in our capitalist society. In a perfect world it would be no issue. However when someone has zero experience and zero directly relevant degree, they need to learn. Using iNaturalist does help one learn but it teaches nothing about the scientific process, how to get permits, deal with govt agencies, how to ID to species in the many many things that need lab workups to do so, etc. So if you don’t know these things you have to learn somewhere, and you won’t be paid to learn in our society(sad truth!). So if it’s something one wants to do, they’ll have to learn somehow: go back to school and pay to learn (expensive to learn, tons of inherent accesability issues there too, and not often practical), or volunteer (free to learn), or even something like Master Naturalist courses if in the US states (low cost).
I think that’s why there are so many (including myself) recommendations to volunteer - in this sort of case it is more a trade of service: teaching for free for free learning.
Volunteering often leads to the somewhat paid as well…ex in my field, often trips to do field work are covered. Are you paid-paid as in a job? no. Is your few weeks in field paid for including travel? yup! This can be a fun trade off as well. But without having the knowledge of that specific work - gained by the volunteering - that further chance is not really achievable.
Everyone has their own boundaries with volunteering; and for sure it can be taken advantage of. IMPO: Folk should think in terms of trade, what are they getting for what they’re giving. The tricky part can be when a long established relationship starts to change - make note of when you are starting to teach the newcomers, for example, in the group. At that point…are you volunteering to learn, or are you actually not being paid to be a leader in the work?
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Well, it isn’t free unless you don’t consider your time valuable at all. Most people need to use that time to work to make money in this system.
I am not saying no one should ever volunteer, and i agree it’s the main path into the field, unfortunately. I just wanted to point out some of the problems as well.
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haha fair.
I think that’s why having a good selftalk about what boundaries one will have with the volunteering is good: what do you want out of it, are you getting it, is it worth it. Cost/benefit analysis with whatever path be it outright money or payment of time is important. And making those lines, holding to them. Both university and volunteer paths can be toxic in their own ways. Being queer femme, university was NOT for me - I never had a chance to do the field I wanted to do (“girls dont do that!”). Volunteering is the way that got me in, and it was easier to float around and find groups that I fit in as a HoH aut person as well. There’s sadly no perfect system for sure, but for me, volunteering was the only choice! And it’s been so much less toxic than uni was!
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