HBCU interns hit the fire lines

HAZEL GREEN, Ala. - Before starting college, Taylor Mohead had never been outside her hometown of Houston, Texas. 

Now, the recent Tuskegee (Ala.) University graduate is trekking around trees in Hazel Green, Ala., in fire gear and the sweltering heat. 

The U.S. Forest Service intern is among 20 students from four Historically Black Colleges or Universities - Florida A&M, Southern University in Louisiana, Tuskegee and Alabama A&M University - who are participating in a prescribed burn demonstration under supervision.

It’s part of an apprenticeship program that will give them the credentials to hit the ground running toward a fire line. 

It’s a grueling way to spend summer break, but Mohead is relishing it. She never pictured herself fighting forest fires.

The on-site fire academy is part of the 1890 Land Grant Institution Wildland Fire Consortium, a partnership between the U.S. Forest Service and a cluster of HBCUs. 

The recruitment effort is at aimed at under-represented minorities in forestry and firefighting. 

“These four HBCUs have some of the top agricultural programs ... in the nation," said Stephanie Love, the USDA Forest Service’s national diversity student programs manager and an Alabama A&M alumna.

"We’re trying to create a pipeline of students who are pursuing natural resources education and forestry and fire.”

The hope is every student comes away with a foundation to chart one of many possible paths in forestry, ecology, agriculture or firefighting. 

The development programs that have come out of the Alabama-Forest Service collaboration responsible for training 66% of Black foresters in the federal agency, said Love. 

Diversity among the Forest Service's wildland firefighters has increased by 20% in the last decade to about 13,000. 

Black fire personnel have remained mostly around 1.3%. Black women make up around half-a-percent.

The dearth of applicants of color may partly be due to a lack of awareness" provided by guidance counselors and recruiters, said Terry Baker, CEO of the Society of American Foresters and its first Black leader.  

Black firefighters can feel intimidated and isolated parachuting into fires in predominately white communities or don’t have crew members of color around them, Baker said. 

The current crop of students says it has been reassuring to meet HBCU alumni who have become fire or forestry professionals, noting there is something special about being in the field surrounded by classmates- turned-crew who look like them. (The AP 07/07/23) US Forest Service and HBCUs unite to boost diversity in wildland firefighting | wwltv.com