Strengthening Ecological Careers – 2022 Annual Report of the ESA

As a professional organization for ecologists, it’s core to ESA’s mission to support the professional development of its members and community. We took big steps forward in 2022 as we built on the last several years of enhanced career support for ecologists.

The certification program continued to grow, with 125 newly certified ecologists across all career levels, but especially including all-time high numbers of new Ecologist in Training and Associate Ecologist awardees. We also welcomed six new approved providers to our list:

American Society of Landscape Architects
Center for Wildlife Studies
Citizen Artist
Society of American Foresters
Sound Solutions for Sustainable Science
Yale Environmental Leadership Training Initiative

Standing room only outside a presentation on graduate school success by ESA leader Kathleen Carroll at the 2022 Annual Meeting — *Standing room only outside a presentation on graduate school success by ESA*
*leader Kathleen Carroll at the 2022 Annual Meeting’s Career Central*

With the return to an in-person Annual Meeting, we were able to re-launch the full Career Central program, which included opportunities to explore different career options (with deep dives into ESG and ecological restoration), workshops on resume writing, interviewing and storytelling, a guide to grad school and, as always, live resume reviews and mock job interviews – more than three dozen total volunteers provided guidance to 250+ attendees, with plenty of follow-up conversations extending into poster sessions and social events. The Annual Meeting also included the REEFS (Resources for Ecology Education – Fair and Share) workshop, with 20 educators joining to explore new advances in successfully teaching ecology at all levels.

Working from home, we hosted 13 virtual events on career-related topics, including two for SEEDS students that allowed 50 undergraduate students to examine career opportunities in ecology. We also launched the second cohort of EcologyPlus in Washington, DC, which includes 15 underrepresented students receiving career mentoring from professionals. Our partner work helped students dig into ecology careers as well—a record 542 students applied for roles in the Scientists in Parks program (hosted by NPS), and 30 students nominated by ESA members were ultimately placed at USGS sites as part of the ESA-USGS Summer Fellowships Program.