Community Engaged Internship with Chicago Wilderness Alliance

The Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant (IISG), in cooperation with the Chicago Wilderness Alliance, is offering a CEI opportunity to support partnerships across their four-state region. The Chicago Wilderness Alliance (the Alliance) is a regional collaborative of 300+ partner organizations working to implement landscape-scale approaches to conservation in and around the southern shores of Lake Michigan including members from Southeast Wisconsin, Northeast Illinois, Northwest Indiana, and Southwest Michigan. The Alliance brings leaders, experts, and mid-career and young-career conservation professionals together to share diverse voices and perspectives and to work towards a common vision: creating and protecting a vibrant, accessible region where people and nature thrive. 

Since its founding in 1996, the Alliance has regularly held an event called the Congress. At the Congress, partners and other interested parties reaffirm their commitment to a shared Green Vision, network and build new professional contacts, and discuss the region’s most pressing environmental challenges. Congress 2024 will be held at Purdue University Northwest in Hammond, Indiana, on November 15. More than 600 people will be invited. Congress 2024 will spotlight the Calumet region's approach to collaborative conservation.  Planning and organizing this event will be a pivotal part of the internship.

Working with the Alliance coordinator, program assistant, and communications consultant, the intern will perform data entry, manage digital assets, create social media posts (both writing and graphic design), assist with meetings, and perform other business tasks. The intern might also support the Alliance’s Green Vision Initiatives by creating newsletter, website, or social media content.

During the CEI program, a series of four professional development trainings, hosted by National Sea Grant, will be offered with topics that may include crafting an application, building partnerships, exploring career pathways or building your brand. Opportunities to participate in other professional development modules and weekly coffee breaks, through Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant, are available to the CEI intern, as their schedule allows.