21 Jul Latino Conservation Week / Semana de Conservacion Latina

Latino Conservation Week is well underway right now.  At the Centennial office, I got to work on communications and social media around Latino Conservation Week.  Myself and Yaneris, LHIP intern at the WASO Comms office, both worked on the translation portion of the press releases for National Park Service and National Park Foundation.  I hope that in the future they continue to release bilingual press releases and social media.  One way to attract a more diverse audience is by being accommodating and this can be done by creating bilingual communications outreach that can be used by Spanish speaking media and that they will then share with their audience.   It was really awesome to see how willing the communications team was to releasing a Spanish press release along with the English version.  I also worked on creating suggested tweets and social media posts for the parks to use in both Spanish and English.  I hope you are all posting on social media using the hashtags #LatinoConservationWeek, #LCW16, #EncuentraTuParque, #FindYourPark, and #NPS100 because posting is one way of keeping track of Latino involvement in the outdoors for others to see.  I believe Latino Conservation Week provides a great gateway to reach a more diverse audience, because it provides a platform for Latino voices to be heard.  Our voices need to be heard, whether it be about the environment or politics, as the largest minority group in this country we need to be represented.  So far, It’s been fun reading about all the events LHIP interns have been coordinating out at park sites across the nation.  Getting to work on this project has been very enjoyable for me and a learning experience, since my background is not in communications.   On a fun note, last week the Centennial Office took an office field trip to Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens.  It was a fun time to get away from the office for an afternoon.  It is currently the blooming season for water lilies and lotuses and Kenilworth has a yearly festival to celebrate this time of year.  Our office trip was two days before the festival, but the lotus were in full bloom.  I had never seen lilies before and it was beautiful.  But it was also super hot, I don’t think I’ll get use to the D.C. humidity.  It’s amazing to think about how a park like Kenilworth can exist within an urban city.  For a moment you can almost forget that you’re still in the city.  It was a fun experience.  While I was there I did notice that the signs were bilingual providing information on the plants and wildlife in English and Spanish, which I loved to see.  I grew up in a household where my parents didn’t speak English and still only know very little, so I was always the one translating for them as a child.  And it’s not always easy to for a child to translate things he or she may still be learning about, so when I see signs that are bilingual it makes me happy because it’s something both parents and children can learn about.