Preserve the Power of America's Parks

By Jay Carter

I grew up in Hazelwood, never imagining that our national parks would be relevant to my life, much less central to my ambitions and to my hopes for my city. But as the federal sequester undercuts funding for those parks, it's time to focus on what they mean even for urban America.

I had the great fortune, while a student at City Charter High School, to be offered a volunteer opportunity with the Student Conservation Association cleaning up Schenley Park. Picking up trash may not sound like an extraordinary career move, but the following summer SCA offered me a volunteer opportunity in Allegheny National Forest, and the year after that I was working on the Appalachian Trail.

By the time I finished high school, I was building trails in Haleakala National Park on Maui. Today, as a college student majoring in geography and urban planning, I'm on SCA's national alumni council, providing policy advice to the only national organization that develops tomorrow's conservation leaders by providing high school and college students with service opportunities in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

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*This article originally appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette