NOAA Fisheries and Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission Promote Fisheries-Related Career Paths for Tribal Youth

Take it from us at NOAA Fisheries: Careers in environmental science and policy are rewarding and offer a wide range of professional opportunities. To help promote workforce development in these fields for tribal members, the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission (NWIFC) and NOAA have partnered to create a Workforce Development Workgroup.

The workgroup provides a forum for NOAA to work collaboratively with tribal governments to support tribal members with career education, training, and recruitment. This engagement enhances NOAA's trust responsibilities and supports education and career development of tribal members in natural resource fields. NWIFC tribes have treaties with the U.S. federal government reserving their right to fish. They are co-managers of the fisheries with the states and federal government.

"Our goal is to connect Native youth with opportunities to learn more about natural resource stewardship and the wide variety of careers available to them," said NWIFC Executive Director Justin Parker. "We want to pass this knowledge down to the next seven generations of leaders so they can continue to protect the natural resources our ancestors secured for us in our treaties."

As part of this effort, the Tulalip Tribes hosted the first-of-its-kind Native Youth Salmon Summit this fall. More than 70 students, teachers, and parents attended the 2-day event. It was held at the Tulalip Reservation on the shores of Puget Sound, near the Snohomish River estuary. Middle and high school students from tribes across the Pacific Northwest learned about their salmon culture, and careers they can pursue to contribute to salmon conservation and recovery.

The summit was supported by organizations including:

• Tulalip Tribes
• Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission
• NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region
• Salmon Defense
• Washington Sea Grant

The Native Youth Salmon Summit featured hands-on activities at the Tulalip salmon hatchery. Students learned how tribal biologists raise coho and Chinook salmon and monitor their returns. On the shores of the Snohomish River estuary, they also learned how NOAA Fisheries and tribal biologists monitor juvenile salmon as they rear before migrating to saltwater environments.

"Our objective is to support tribal youth to go into fishing, conservation management, and science careers," said Dan Tonnes, workforce development specialist for NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region and the NOAA Office of Education. "The very experienced tribal folks are retiring and looking for younger tribal members to take their place, but we need to connect them with the educational and career pathways to take advantage of these opportunities."

The workgroup followed up the summit with a webinar in December for tribal high school and college students, as well as young professionals. They learned about career development opportunities at NOAA, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Washington SeaGrant.

The workgroup meets quarterly and is working to create a tribal youth advisory board and mentoring program. It is developing a tutoring and classroom presentation program for NOAA staff to support tribal students, among other initiatives. Participating staff include NOAA employees from:

• Office of Education
• NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region
• National Ocean Service Marine Debris Program
• NOAA Fisheries science centers