WASHINGTON, DC—As part of the recently released Strengthening Tribal Consultations and Nation To-Nation Relationships: A USDA Forest Service Action Plan, the Forest Service launched the Indian Youth Service Corps. The pilot partnership was launched under five multi-year agreements with several partners and tribes and will expand opportunities for federally recognized Indian tribes, tribal organizations, Alaska Native Tribes, Alaska Native Corporations, and Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders to participate in Public Lands Corps activities. The new corps creates career and educational opportunities for Indigenous youth while fostering cultural connections to nature through conservation projects on Indian, Native Hawaiian homelands and public lands. By engaging Indigenous youth in land stewardship and conservation, the corps incorporates Indigenous knowledge and values into conservation and land management initiatives while building experience among future conservation leaders.

“IYSC provides our participants the opportunity to engage with the land to achieve natural resource outcomes in a way that centers the wisdom of our indigenous communities, reawakening a connection to both the land and their cultural way of being in relationship with it,” said Chas Robles, director of the Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps. The co-stewardship model offered through Indian Youth Service Corps brings together the Forest Service and those with Indigenous knowledge to create a win-win for the landscapes we manage and the people who benefit from the land.

With a $5.6 million multi-year investment in agreements with tribes and Conservation Corps partners, the Forest Service engaged 206 Indigenous youth in this inaugural year. From learning tree measurement and fuels mitigation to assisting with monitoring, stand improvement and inventorying seed trees, these youth were engaged in a wide array of land management work. The program also provided participants training on life skills and career preparedness. In addition to hands-on work, they gathered invaluable insights by interviewing elders on traditional uses of yellow cedar.  

These investments capitalize on provisions in the REPLANT Act and the Inflation Reduction Act to address the national reforestation strategy and implementation of the wildfire crisis strategy. A Request For Information (USDA-FS-2023-24-40-WFD) has also been published to identify new indigenous partnerships, engagement with an agency advisory group and collaboration with Forest Service leadership to identify and recommend policy changes to implement this program.  

To learn more about Indian Youth Service Corps or other workforce development programs, please visit the Workforce Development Partnerships Service Hub.