Chapter 2
Establishing an undergraduate foundation

Deciding that you want to devote your career to conservation is a good start up the mountain, but of course it is not sufficient in itself. You have to be willing and able; a good do-er as well as a do-gooder. You need skills and knowledge as well as commitment and purpose. In this chapter we will focus on some ways to start developing those attributes while you are an undergraduate student, or an older person seriously considering a switch to conservation. If you are successful, you may well be adequately prepared to start a conservation career with a bachelor's degree and a modicum of extracurricular or professional experience, but as we will cover in Chapter 3, we generally recommend using these preparations as a foundation for advanced education as a graduate student. Thus many of the topics covered below are examined more thoroughly in later chapters from the perspective of a graduate student.

Universities and Degrees

There is a dizzying array of institutions where you can pursue higher education in conservation as broadly defined in this book.2.1 Indeed, tertiary institutions that do not have some form of conservation or environmental program are quite uncommon, especially when you consider the vast array of disciplines that contribute to conservation. There are even some places (e.g., the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, the College of the Atlantic, and the College of Environmental Science and Forestry of the State University of New York) where this discipline is a dominant theme for the entire institution.

The list of possible degrees you could pursue is also seemingly endless, with many larger universities offering dozens of choices that could be appropriate for an aspiring conservation professional. Some will have obvious titles, such as Natural Resources Management, Ecology, and Environmental Studies, whereas others might surprise you, such as Civil Engineering, Law, or Resource Economics. Most will be bachelor's degrees but there are some associate degrees and diplomas that also can lead to professional employment in conservation.

We have assumed that most readers of this book have made their first step towards a career in conservation by having enrolled in an undergraduate degree program that is somewhat related to conservation, more likely public policy or biology than music or mathematics. However, if you are still in the market for an undergraduate program, you will find some advice, useful in broad brush strokes, on selecting universities and degrees in Chapter 3, where we cover the topic from the perspective of an undergraduate selecting a graduate program. Later in this chapter we address the issues faced by a person who is considering switching to conservation from a different career track, either during a university degree or long after earning one.

Course Work

With conservation covering such a breadth of topics it is not possible to offer a long, detailed list of courses that every aspiring conservation professional should take. Nevertheless we feel on reasonably solid ground suggesting that three subjects should lie at the foundation of almost every conservation curriculum, even for people who end up far from the scientific side of conservation (e.g., as an environmental lawyer). First, there is biology; clearly you need to understand life if you want to conserve life on Earth. Second, ecology is essentially the environmental side of biology and you need particular strength in this topic. Third, you will want to take one or more courses on conservation issues and how they are solved, which will likely involve the intersection of ecology with the human dimensions surrounding natural resource management.

The conservationists who have the biggest impact on the world are not hermits. They are out in public communicating their knowledge and perspectives. Consequently you should take courses that will hone your skills in both written and oral communication. These may be courses in speech, writing, photography, journalism, or social media, or courses within your core curriculum that require writing multiple papers, generating social media content, and speaking in front of the class on a regular basis. If you are much more comfortable with one mode of communication than the other, work on your weakness. Although universities often stress academic writing, being effective with other types of written, visual, and oral expression and a variety of outlets may allow you to reach a broader audience.

The conservationists who have the biggest impact on the world are not hermits. They are out in public communicating their knowledge and perspectives.

Balancing the need for both depth and breadth is often an interesting challenge. For example, you may want to take many ecology courses - such as behavioral ecology, marine ecology, forest ecology, and physiological ecology - but at some point this will constrain your ability to pursue breadth, most notably some social science courses - such as resource economics - that will make you more effective at dealing with human institutions. Conversely, if you are focusing on the social-science side of conservation, you should consider taking a course like ecosystem dynamics or ornithology rather than another economics class.

To some degree, these decisions will be made for you because graduating with a particular degree requires working to fulfill certain university requirements, although the latitude allowed varies enormously among universities. Whenever you have choices to make it is obviously wise to look beyond the immediate issues (e.g., is your best friend taking the course?) to how well a course will serve you down the road. For example, a macroeconomics class may be a tough slog now, but if later you apply for a graduate assistantship to study resource economics it will serve you well. Some conservation students shy away from classes in math, economics, and statistics, but these provide an important background for many careers in conservation.

Your advisor (known as a supervisor in some parts of the world) will know the options for your university and can help you find your way through all these decisions, so be sure to express your interest in becoming a conservation professional. Getting good advice may entail switching advisors; for example, if you are in a biology department where most of the advisors are focused on preparing students for careers in medicine, or in a civil-engineering program where building roads and bridges completely overshadows construction of water-treatment systems. Having a conservation-oriented advisor is especially useful for looking at issues that go beyond the university, such as meeting the professional certification standards that some professional societies have developed, establishing a network of future colleagues, or pointing you toward an opportunity for practical experience.

Course Performance

You may feel that you have spent most of your life striving to earn good grades but, as you know, this is not just an exercise in pleasing your parents. The people who select employees and graduate students believe that earning good grades requires some combination of intelligence and hard work and therefore grades are a significant consideration. With poor or even mediocre grades your application may not make it past the first filter. Fortunately, it is fairly common for students to have a lack-luster overall average grade but one that improved steadily through their undergraduate career, or one that is much better for courses in their discipline. If this is the case for you it is worth highlighting this pattern in any application letters.

Course performance may be measured primarily by grades, but not exclusively. Every faculty member knows students who are not at the top of the class in terms of grades, but who outshine everyone else in terms of their attitude and work ethic. They are always on time for class, ask good questions, undertake assignments with enthusiasm, greet people warmly in the halls, volunteer for extracurricular activities, and so on. When it comes to references for a job, people with these kinds of characteristics may be just as likely to be recommended as someone who scored highest on the last exam. Of course, your best bet is to earn superb grades and be a pleasant, enthusiastic person. The point is that your social skills are very important to your professional advancement and this begins in the classroom, where your instructors and fellow students are essentially your first colleagues. Although excellent grades and classroom social skills are important, they are not sufficient to carry an application that is very weak in other respects, as we will see in the next section.

Your social skills are very important to your professional advancement and this begins in the classroom, where your instructors and fellow students are essentially your first colleagues.

Experiences Outside the Classroom

Short-term jobs

Not so long ago most people learned their key skills informally - how to grow a garden, cook a meal, or repair an engine - either from their family or as an apprentice to a professional. Acquiring skills outside the classroom is also a critical part of becoming a conservation professional. For example, here is a list of some general skills that you may be more likely to learn in a short-term job than in class: working both independently and as part of a team, problem-solving, communicating with the public, recording data meticulously, functioning well under adverse...