Project overview: Fund an intern to lead event planning, communication, and project management of community events celebrating diversity and multicultural understanding.

How your support helps: The need to recruit and support a diverse workforce across the National Park Service and Yosemite’s own community has been underscored repeatedly in the news media, by visitors and outside organizations, and internally. 

Numerous efforts are in place to recruit a diverse workforce, including the Yosemite Leadership Program, Mosaics in Science internships, and other initiatives that give participants hiring status with NPS upon completion. But many of these candidates still face bias and challenges upon reaching the workplace; meeting an unwelcoming culture, they may burn out and leave. 

Your support helps strengthen Yosemite’s RDI efforts — through employee resource groups, facilitated workshops and dialogues, and more — to lead retention and culture change efforts in the workforce, and to better serve each other and our visitors. 

This year: In 2024, your gifts will support the NPS Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Council to advance equity in our workforce by planning at least four large, celebratory, community–building events; holding dialogues and trainings; and encouraging strategic cooperation parkwide. By funding an intern to coordinate events, such as LGBTQ Pride, we can celebrate and showcase the resiliency and diversity of the Yosemite community and create a culture that is inclusive of all employees and visitors.

Project partners: Yosemite National Park, Mariposa County, and Allies for Inclusion Leadership

Sally Martinez

Project Notes

"This grant will help community members and candidates to see Yosemite as an inclusive place, appreciative of its own diverse talent and the many cultures that contribute and connect to this place."