Job Corps Civilian Conservation Centers

When it comes to Forest Service Job Corps, we have 60 years of successes to celebrate. And we have something unique to offer the whole agency: our students. Our work is training and education, and our students learn best when they get the chance to perform paid work in a real work setting. Our work not only changes lives—it changes trajectories for entire families. I invite you all to take on a student for a work-based learning assignment. They'll learn and gain career skills while delivering our Forest Service mission.

It’s been a long, grueling day on the fire line. Wildland firefighters, with faces full of soot and ash file wearily towards the building at the center of the camp. A door swings open, and bright yellow fabric lines the exterior walls of the room. The aroma of sautéed vegetables entices the firefighters inside. Bright pots and pans are a warm welcome from the outdoor elements. Inside a bustling kitchen is alive with Job Corps advanced culinary students moving with purpose to feed wildland firefighters returning from a day of taxing work.

MONTANA — With wildland fire winding down in parts of the country, the equipment and supplies critical for incident management support are being returned to caches across the country for cleaning, refurbishment and storage--or to be shipped out to new incidents. Most of this equipment is also used as part of other all-risk incidents such as floods, hurricanes, and search and rescue efforts. The National Interagency Support Cache system manages sixteen all-risk incident equipment caches nationwide. These caches rely on administratively determined employees during peak fire activity.

ILLINOIS — Cass and Mingo Job Corps civilian conservation centers masonry students, led by HistoriCorps professionals, completed critical stone restoration work on the Goose Bay Shelter at Shawnee National Forest. The masons removed and reinstalled the flagstone masonry surrounding the shelter and rehabilitated the exterior stone steps. Working on the project allowed the young masons to refine skills such as mixing mortar, designing layout, leveling stones, and tuckpointing. Located on the Lake Glendale recreation area, the Goose Bay shelter restoration efforts will protect the structure from further deterioration and pave the way for future improvements.