Vashon Nature Center provides opportunity
for students to get outside
By Ashley Rice, Reporter
There are many jobs for students on the island, and the Vashon Nature Center or VNC is one of them. The VNC is based on Vashon-Maury Island and is a non-profit organization. According to their website, the VNC’s mission is to create fun nature experiences through community science, research, and education to benefit the island and the rest of the Sound. The team consists of Bianca Perla, the director of the VNC; Maria Metler, the education programs manager; and Valeria Martinez Espinoza, the community education specialist.
The VNC operates year round. 2022 offerings for summer internships included a marine science internship where students helped with beach and cliff nesting bird surveys. They then uploaded the cliff nesting bird data into the regional database. Another internship offered was watershed restoration in which these students split their time working on three subject areas that addressed watershed health: the Heron Meadow wetland restoration, restoration activities in Vashon parks and preserves, and stormwater management planning. The VNC uses donations to pay their interns and for the different programs they run yearly. This year, the VNC is planning on opening up very similar—if not the same—internship opportunities as last year.
“We’re going to open up five internships that are paid,” Perla said. “People will be helping us do beach surveys, snorkel surveys, and kayak surveys with kelp, and we’re also going to have time to get to know other interns from other programs around the Puget Sound.”
It often isn’t easy for students to connect with their passions at school, so hands-on learning like what the VNC offers can help show them the fun and interesting parts of science and science-based careers.
“I didn’t even know I was interested in science until I actually did a work internship experience and I
saw how fun this job was and how happy the scientists were to be doing their job and how they just couldn’t stop talking about the species that they loved,” Perla said.
The VNC has lots of different internships that are designed to help students explore nature and the world of science.
“I did the marine science internship and the watershed restoration internship. I split my time between doing some trail maintenance in the Judd Creek trails and doing meadow restoration in Heron Meadow which included tree planting and invasive species removal,” senior Oliver Churchill said. “Then, with the marine science internship, I did some surveys, some beach surveys, and then some snorkel surveys. It was pretty fun.”
Some workplaces aren’t flexible with time despite how important it is for anyone trying to work on island. Ferry difficulties and oth
er challenges commuters face just trying to get to Vashon, flexibility is a big deciding factor in where to work. Since the VNC makes it a priority to be flexible, they are a great place for off-island students to work. “[The VNC] really made everything super easy, and if you had to adjust the times because something came up because of the ferry systems, they were always so chill about it and that’s what I really liked the most,” senior Oskar Weiss said.
Most of the students that took part in these internships last year had amazing things to say about the instructors and the activities they participated in.
“Any kind of internship with the VNC [is one] I would definitely recommend because you get a lot of experience with people that are really qualified to do all of this work. And you’re learning how people get data on the island that we live on,” junior Alana Bass said.
For more information visit https://vashonnaturecenter.org/ or reach out to maria@vashonnaturecenter.org. For a Spanish contact vale@vashonnaturecenter.org.