YOU’LL LOVE VOLUNTEERING AT PEEC!
Here are some of our opportunities…
1 Docent: The ambassadors of PEEC.
Work a regular shift or fill in as needed. Docents are visitors’ first impression of us, and they handle visitor questions, orientation to exhibits, gift shop purchases—everything! It is a fun job interacting with many nice, happy-to-be-here people and keeping up with all the goings on at PEEC. Docents work in shifts of 2-4 hours and should be friendly and customer service oriented.
2 Exhibits:
We are looking for someone who would be excited about editing exhibit content, Image gathering, and Identifying community experts to help write new content and assist in exhibit maintenance. You will work closely with our Director of Interpretation, Kristen.
3 Interpretation:
Nature Up Close – if you have a specific passion and knowledge set, this is for you. We are always looking for volunteers that are interested in being one of our naturalists. Teach about our local wildlife and plants, explore our skies in the planetarium, and other STEAM-related topics. All Nature Up Close events are free, but they are dependent on volunteer availability.
4 Nature walk guides:
Volunteers who know flora, fauna, and native wildflowers and trees. Join us for a hiking experience where the emphasis is on the discovery, not the mileage gained. The Gentle Walker group explores trails of around three miles, meandering from one item of interest to another. The group spends a bit of the time in silence, either sitting or walking to get a sense of the landscape. The group meets at 9:00 a.m. on Fridays at the nature center and returns between 11:30 a.m. and noon.
5 Critter Care: Help look after our salamanders, frogs, snakes, and bugs.
If you love small animals, as well as learning how to care for them, you can help take care of our critters. You will be trained to clean their tanks and bring them food and water. Your love of and sensitivity to animals will help you with this fun and important task. Routine critter care takes place on Mondays, Wednesdays through Saturdays, from 12 – 3:30 pm, but there may also be odd jobs available that could be done at other times. All training is provided, but because of the training involved, we can only accept a limited number of volunteers, and we ask that prospective volunteers be willing to help every week for at least one season.
6 Bird Feeding: Help us feed the local and migratory birds that visit PEEC’S viewing area.
Several feeders need to be put up in the morning and removed at the end of the day. If they are left out, then various annoying critters will get into them and make a mess out of things. Most annoyingly, raccoons will pull hummingbird and suet feeders off their hooks, drain them and scatter the feeders all over the place. And then in bear season, we do not want to train the bears to look for food at the nature center.
7 Gardening Apprenticeship: With Natali & Larry.
This is for those deeply passionate about gardening and very detail oriented. We are looking for people to do an apprenticeship with Natali Steinberg and Larry Deaven. Natali’s creative passion and skill are responsible for the beautiful raised bed gardens, while Larry is the inspiration and drive behind the unrivaled Penstemon Garden.
8 Odd jobs: Be on call for a little of this and a little of that.
We can use all sorts of help, so don’t worry if you want to volunteer but don’t fit into any of the above categories. We need help with grounds clean up, gardening help, Wildlife Habitat Area maintenance, help with special events or programs, painting, building, cleaning…all sorts of tasks! You never know when we’ll need someone to shovel sand into our new sandbox in the nature play area or help clean up after a big presentation, do some weeding, or collect some natural materials for kids’ activity. Volunteers need only enthusiasm!
9 Education Support: Help kids connect with nature & have fun too!
Our Education Team always needs occasional help with school field trips and children’s programs. These are usually short-term 1-2 hour events and involve mostly helping keep track of the kids and helping set up/take down any event materials. School education volunteers should enjoy kids and any experience with crafts or games is helpful but not necessary.
10 Education Help: Nature Play Time Help kids connect with nature & have fun too!
Help Kids start their week off by playing outside! Meets every Monday from 10 – 11 AM (except holidays) and allows toddlers, preschoolers, and their caregivers to come to the nature center and explore the natural world with PEEC’s educators. Each Playtime features outdoor play, sensory exploration, and activities focusing on a theme in nature. Come and join the fun outside with other local families! Free – no registration required.
11 Education Help: Forest Explorers Help kids connect with nature & have fun too!
Our Forest Explorers Hike and Play class allows kids, ages 5 through 8, to go on weekly hikes into the canyon next to the nature center for child-directed play in the canyons, creeks, and surrounding forest. Children will build forts, make seasonal observations, and learn to identify different plants and animals. Forest Explorers, taught by educator Denise Matthews, allows children to have fun outside while working cooperatively, building gross motor skills, and learning more about the local ecology.
12 Planetarium Projection: A great technical job for science and astronomy types.
We need people to help run our planetarium projectors for Night Sky shows and other media screenings. This is a somewhat skilled position and we provide training, but volunteers should have a technical aptitude and some knowledge of science and/or astronomy. Projectionists give a brief presentation before each screening so you should be comfortable with some public speaking.
13 Program Presenters: Share your unique knowledge and help educate others.
If you have a background in or knowledge of any topic that might be of interest to our members and the public please contact us! We always look for people to help give talks, slide shows, presentations, or other events that support our mission of enriching lives by strengthening people’s connection to our canyons, mesas, mountains, and skies. Program presenters help build community and inspire us to learn and better ourselves, so if you spent a few years studying a wildlife habitat, if you are a forest firefighter, environmental scientist, amateur astronomer, backwoods survivalist, medicinal herb expert, or have any such background, please consider sharing your passion, knowledge, and expertise!
14 Critter Outreach: Talk to visitors about animals.
If you love animals, you can learn to do public animal demos and answer questions about our live animal exhibits. Your love of and sensitivity to animals, especially snakes, will help you with this fun and important task. Because of the training required, we ask that prospective volunteers be willing to help regularly for at least one year.
15 Mailing Parties & Take Home Projects: Stuff envelopes, stick on labels, and eat cookies together!
We do periodic mailing parties to get our bulk mailings out, including our quarterly newsletter, fundraising drives, and other mailings. It helps to get as many hands involved as possible and get the job done, which also makes it more fun! Volunteers need no special skills, just attention to detail and an openness to meet new people. We are now able to take home projects to make it easier to complete.
16 Data Entry: Help us with adding metrics and critical information into our database.
We track a lot of information about our services such as visitor numbers, program attendance, program ratings, adding people to our mailing list, planetarium show sales, and so on because we care about how we’re doing. And all of this information needs to be entered into our database so we can use it. Data Entry Volunteers should have a little computer experience, Mac is helpful, and we can train too—it’s not hard!
17 Fundraising: Bring your grant writing, publicity, or graphics skills to PEEC!
Have you ever researched a grant? Put these valuable skills to work for The Nature Center. Every non-profit needs a small army of fundraising angels to help us with these important efforts. Even if your experience is limited we can provide some training to get you going.
18 Marketing: Bring your publicity, or graphics skills to PEEC!
Do you have experience with social media, public relations, marketing, graphic design, or promotion? Do you know a lot of people and do a lot of socializing and entertaining? Whether you help design a new brochure, call attendees of our programs to gather demographic info, or host a PEEC party to introduce your influential friends to our cause, you can make a difference!
19 Photo Contest & Slide Show for PEEC TV (PowerPoint ): Help choose Photos, set up the slide show, and announce the winner.
Each month, the Pajarito Environmental Education Center (PEEC) runs a photo contest at the Los Alamos County Nature Center. Five photos are continuously displayed in the nature center, where visitors can view them and then vote for their favorite photo by putting money into one (or more) of five labeled canisters below the display. The canister with the largest amount of money wins the contest for that month.
20 Blog Updates: Help keep our website’s content fresh and new!
If you have experience with WordPress, you can help us post blogs written by our lovely volunteers to our website. As a blog post publisher, you will be responsible for formatting and uploading blog posts onto our website. This can range from 1 or 2 to 5+ a month.
21 Youtube Uploading: Help keep our Youtube channel updated.
If you have any video editing experience, this job is for you! Many people unable to attend our live-streamed talks go to our youtube channel to view what they missed. Help us keep our viewers in the loop by editing our recorded live-streamed talks and uploading them to youtube. This job is on a per-case basis and depends on how many live-streamed talks we have recorded for the month.
22 Editing: The Slayer of all typos!
Calling all English teachers, former English teachers, or lovers of correct spelling and grammar, this job is for you! We deal with words a lot here: for social media, letters & grants, press releases, etc. In dealing with these words, mistakes are often made. We need someone with a sharp eye for correct grammar, spelling, and dates to help us with proofreading.
23 Social Media: Help us manage our online presence.
Do you have experience in managing social media? We need your help consistently posting to our Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn pages, engaging with followers, and coming up with new and exciting ideas for content.
24 Volunteer Outreach and Celebration: Help PEEC grow our Volunteer community.
Do you have a passion for supporting your community through volunteer work? Would you like to learn how volunteer management and celebration work firsthand? This is the perfect opportunity for you! You would help with volunteer recruitment by participating in local events, while helping support and celebrate your fellow volunteers by sending out handwritten birthday cards and thank you cards. Most excitingly you would help plan 2 volunteer celebration events here at PEEC.
25 Community outreach: Help us Connect with an ever growing community.
PEEC representative at PEEC special events and tabling at community events in or near Los Alamos. Represent PEEC, do crafts with kids, hand out Trick or Treat at Main Street, help educate families about nature at Los Luceros, and more…
Contact our volunteer coordinator, Ryan at ryan@pajaritoeec.org or 505-662-0460 any time!