The NPS is committed to developing its personnel by offering support through its Workforce Development Experience Grant Program. Through this internal program NPS employees are provided funding support to participate in career experiences that enable them to devlop well-rounded technical and leadership skills.

There are several options available to NPS employees wishing to broaden their fire experience base and exercise leadership skills in an incident environment. Employees can seek assignments onTraining IHC’s, NPS IHC’s, Wildland Fire Modules and NPS Helicopter Modules. Each of these options has their merits, however based on each resources primary mission one may be better suited than another to meeting developmental needs. Generally, the training IHC’s would be ideal for an individual looking to gain leadership training and experience functioning in a squadboss or crewboss role.

These programs have training curriculum designed to maximize studies in leadership, human factors and decision-making. The NPS IHC programs would be ideal for a new permanent employee desiring to gain experience in the handcrew environment. Generally these crews do not focus on leadership, decision making and human factors in their pre-season training, rather the focus is on preparing personnel for a summer on the fireline.

Wildland Fire Modules can provide opportunities to work on skills such as fire effects monitoring, fuels sampling methods as well as traditional suppression based skills employed in a handcrew configuration. The modules can provide opportunities for short or long-term details.

Helicopter Modules offer aviation specific skills development opportunities as well as opportunities to build experience in providing leadership in the initial response phase of an incident.

National Park Service employees wishing to learn more should visit the Inside NPS site.