There are some things only another MAI member will understand.

The oddly specific trail snack preferences. The boots that have been through more than you have. The endless acronyms that eventually start sounding like completely normal words.

The weather that definitely wasn’t what the forecast promised.

The field story you’ve told approximately 47 times.
And the experience of trying to explain what you actually did during your service term to someone who wasn’t there.

But there are some bigger shared experiences, too. Learning what you’re capable of. Getting to know a place in a completely different way. Meeting people who become friends, mentors, coworkers, and part of your life long after the term ends.

We’ve started the list, but this one really belongs to the people who lived it.

MAI alumni, finish the sentence:
You know you were an MAI member if __________.
The more oddly specific, the better. 👇

#landstewardship #giffordpinchot

Mt. Adams is in our name, but MAI’s story has never belonged to just one mountain.

Over the years, members served in forests, parks, wildlife refuges, ranger districts, communities, and public lands throughout the Pacific Northwest and far beyond it.

Each place brought something different. Different landscapes. Different communities. Different challenges. Different work to be done.

For the people who served there, those locations often became more than a dot on a map. They became the backdrop to long days in the field, new skills, friendships, challenges, accomplishments, and memories that lasted well beyond the end of a service term.

There are far too many places to fit into one carousel, but these are a few that became part of MAI’s story over the years.

Alumni, where did your MAI experience take you? 🌲

#landstewardship #giffordpinchot

A service term has a start date and an end date.

It’s everything that happens in between that’s a little harder to put on paper.

You arrive in a new place, meet new people, start training, and begin learning what the work actually looks like. Before long, you’re out in the field putting those skills to use, solving problems, adjusting when plans change, and learning things you probably couldn’t have learned in a classroom.

But ask former MAI members what they remember about their service term and the answer probably isn’t just a list of projects.

It’s the people they met. The mentors who helped them along the way. The hard days they made it through. The ridiculous field stories. The places they got to know. The skills they didn’t have when they started.

And for many, it’s where they started figuring out what they wanted to do next.

A service term may only last for a season or a year, but what comes out of it can stick around much longer.

#landstewardship #nationalforests #giffordpinchot