Jill Hawk, regional chief ranger for the National Park Service in the Northeast, helped establish ProRangers Philadelphia at Temple University.
Temple University partners with National Park Service to prepare rangers for law enforcement at urban parks
By Albert C. Jones
America, The Diversity Place
PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania — Meet Jill A. Hawk, being interviewed on a concrete bench in front of the U.S. Customs building at 200 Chestnut Street in the heart of Philadelphia. The location is definitive inner-city and the world couldn’t be more urban near downtown Philadelphia, even amid places that came with the birth of a nation.
Hawk, since gone on to fulfill other career objectives, was at the time regional chief ranger for the National Park Service in the Northeast. She was more than pleased this afternoon to sit for an interview outside. Security is tight at the U.S. Customs building. The interview took place without scrutiny, foregoing the requirement to pass through metal detectors, bag checks and armed guards.
The Associated Press ran a story on ProRanagers Philadelphia that went national. CNN Money ran a feature on ProRangers Philadelphia. A story about completion of the first summer internship of ProRangers was also reported as a feature story by National Public Radio’s “Morning Edition.”
ProRangers Philadelphia is an academic, technical skills training internship program that is cooperatively administered by the National Park Service and Temple University. Yes to the question, “Do the interns get paid?” The program was established to recruit, train and employ law enforcement park rangers for the National Park Service, primarily for service in the systems urban parks and at national landmarks.
Philadelphia, of course, has its fair share of national historic landmarks with the Liberty Bell and Constitution Hall, naming just a couple. Philadelphia is the perfect place to establish a program for recruiting future park rangers to work in urban areas. Temple, of course, is considered by many to be among the finest urban-centered universities in the world and is a worthy partner for this program.
Temple University is about two miles north of where Jill Hawk now sits on a bench outside her office building.
“We focus on recruiting in urban areas,” said Hawk, who has had a busy view days responding to interview requests. “We recruit college students in Philadelphia. Temple University is the second most diverse college in the country. It has a top criminal justice program. Temple is strong academically.”
Upon graduation from Temple University and successfully completing the ProRangers program, participants are placed in a permanent career tenure law enforcement park ranger position with the National Park Service.
“With 55 percent of our workforce eligible to retire in five years, we must work hard at bringing new people in to fill positions that will be opening throughout the National Park Service,” Hawk said. “That is one of the three objectives managers throughout the organization are working to meet. With hiring, we want to retain our younger workers.”
Mandatory retirement age for park rangers is 57. The third objective of the National Park Service is filling jobs with applicants that reflect demographics of a diverse nation.
“Seventy percent of our universal workforce is white,” Hawk said. “If you walk around the streets of Philadelphia, you know that our universal workforce is not reflective of the population in America we serve.”
Dottie Vauls, from Severna Park, Maryland, and Keith Bassolina, Queens, New York, are exceptions to park rangers who prefer stationing in wilderness parks. Vauls had an internship near Grand Junction, Colorado in 2006 before becoming a full-time ranger in 2008 at Independence National Historic Park. Bassolina, also assigned to Independence Hall, has been a park ranger since 2007.
Students like Tia Solomon, who has studied violin and viola and was undecided on a major, are perfect, as far as Hawk is concerned, for myth-breaking and the beginning of a new generation of park rangers who grew up in urban areas and educated at urban colleges.
Like Solomon, students from disciplines other than criminal justice majors were in the first class of ProRangers Philadelphia.
“A number are criminal justice students, but we also have students who are majoring in horticulture, anthropology and urban studies,” Hawk said. “We are not limiting. With Temple, we decided early on not to say no to those not necessarily interested in studying criminal justice. We make it work for us. It’s not just diversity in gender, but it is academic diversity and a mosaic of where students come from as well.”
Decision time falls between the summer of students’ junior and senior year. Then ProRangers will be enrolled in the 10-week Seasonal Law Enforcement Training Program at Temple University. Success means being fast-tracked into a park ranger position following graduation.
“ProRangers offers student the opportunity to experience different work environments and working with the public,” Hawk said. “It’s an opportunity to do work that is mission oriented. With ProRangers, they do it in an urban area. We want to get away from the myth of wilderness rangers, myth that rangers are only in Yosemite and Yellowstone.”
Thirteen students were in the first year of ProRangers Philadelphia that started in February 2010. They spent late May through mid-August at different parks, from the early English settlements in Virginia, at Independence National Historic Park here in Philadelphia and battlefields of the Civil War. Solomon, a sophomore, was assigned to Baltimore’s historic Fort McHenry.
“It’s a four-year program,” Hawk said. “After acceptance, students become part our Student Career Employment Program. The first internship gives them park orientation. We assess them to see if they are right for the job. If they are criminal justice students, the sophomore internship will be more focused on law enforcement. Some students are placed into an accelerated program.
“My focus and goal, as a work performance goal, is to increase the effort we put into diversifying our workforce,” Hawk said. “Our selling point to get students into ProRangers Philadelphia is to offer them a career that means something, is mission focused and quite stable, especially with the economy the way it is. Jobs have excellent benefits. You can retire after 20 years of service at certain ages or at any age after 25 years of service.
“With these students, it’s not just about the money but doing a job that is worthwhile.”
Just days after this interview, Hawk was selected as the superintendent of Morristown National Historical Park in New Jersey. Before being selected as regional chief ranger in 2005, Hawk was chief ranger at Mount Rainier National Park in Washington.
Hawk began her NPS career in 1989 as a seasonal park ranger, first at Fire Island National Seashore in New York and then at Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. Hawk also had assignments at the Statue of Liberty National Monument (1990-1991), Everglades National Park (1991-1996), and Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina (1996-2000).
Dottie Vauls, full-time park ranger since 2008 from Severna Park, Maryland, gives directions to a visitor at Independence National Historic Park in Philadelphia.