Cabela's Outdoor Fund Awards Grant to Boone and Crockett/Camp Woodie Fellowship Program

A partnership between the Boone and Crockett Club and the South Carolina Waterfowl Association (SCWA) has been awarded a $64,000 grant by Cabela's Outdoor Fund to create new learning opportunities for youths interested in wildlife conservation careers.

The partnership between the two conservation organizations is called the Boone and Crockett/Camp Woodie Fellowship Program. The grant from Cabela's Outdoor Fund will cover all travel, room and board expenses of fellowship recipients during the two-week program, which will include study and field work in both South Carolina and Montana.

In Spring 2016, 30 Camp Woodie alums will be selected to receive the fellowship made possible through the grant from Cabela's. Fellowship recipients will attend Level-3 classes at Camp Woodie, located at the SCWA Wildlife Education Center in Pinewood, S.C. During this weeklong course, fellowship recipients will interact with wildlife professionals and learn more about careers in wildlife/fisheries conservation and education.

At the end of the Level-3 Camp Woodie session, students will go west to spend a week on Boone and Crockett's 6,000-acre Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch near Choteau, Mont. There they will further their study of wildlife conservation and take part in a five-day Outdoor Adventure Camp instructed by western wildlife professionals. 

"We're excited to be able to expand conservation education opportunities for more young people," Boone and Crockett Club Conservation Programs Manager Luke Coccoli said. "Conservation evolves and the next generation of conservation professionals will benefit from exposure to a wide range of disciplines, not only to find out where the needs will be in the future, but what will suit them and their interests best."

To qualify, applicants must be age 16-17 and have attended all three levels of the SCWA Camp Woodie summer fish and wildlife conservation camp program.

For more information or to apply for the fellowship, contact Justin Grider, director of Camp Woodie operations for SCWA, at (803) 452-6001 or [email protected]. More information about SCWA's Camp Woodie and the Boone and Crockett Club's Wildlife Conservation Skills Camp can be found at www.wildlifeedcenter.org