Connections

The work is worthy and good, but for so many volunteers, it’s the people. The WMC community is composed of artists, scientists, explorers, idealists and public policy wonks, to name just a few of the kinds of folks who have found their way out to the Wrangells and participated in building our organization since the first field studies students began arriving in McCarthy in 1971.

There is something for every skill level and every schedule. Whether volunteering remotely from the comfort of your coziest couch or joining us in the summer at our off-grid campus in downtown McCarthy, you can have an impact. Plug in with an ongoing task or participate on a short-term project.

Join others in the WMC family who share your love and appreciation for nature and place.

Immersive, Transformative

• 20 hours of scheduled work plus approximately 10 hours of community chores and other miscellany. The rest of the time is yours to explore the area, and connect with the McCarthy community and participate in communal summer life at the WMC.

• Meals and primitive lodging (valued at approximately $1,000/month) are provided.

• Live on the WMC campus in the heart of McCarthy

• Share space and work with intentional staff and volunteers

• Experience a season of off-grid living in remote Alaska

• Spend quality time in America’s largest national park

• Hike or fly to remote backcountry locations in Wrangell St. Elias

Skills to bring:

• Facilities — Repairs and maintenance; Building projects (from small woodsheds to housing)

• Gardening — Help grow food to feed the campus

• Kitchen — Help cook for our programs and staff

– community –

– Off-Grid Living –

– Intentional –

Connect with Your People, Contribute to the cause

• Facilities & Gardening — Repairs and maintenance; Building projects (from small woodsheds to housing); Beautifying and cleaning the campus; Take on a specific project or just schedule a time to show up and pitch in w/ whatever help is needed

• Creative and artistic work — Donate your creativity and help keep the WMC looking like…well, looking like the WMC with our own unique vibe: quirky, beautiful, rustic, funky, contemplative and of course always welcoming

• Kitchen: Baking, Cooking, and Clean up — There’s always something to do in the kitchen and never a dull moment!

• Help w/ Fundraisers

• Programs: Plug in and lend a hand to support a specific program that you particularly appreciate

• Help transport food and supplies from Anchorage to McCarthy

– Sharing –

– Creating –

– exploring –

Enlist your laptop and help from home

• Program Planning — Plug in w/ a program and help organize and promote programs like our Field Studies program, Tall Tales, Artist in Residence, Summer Arts & Lecture Series, and workshops like the Wrangell Mountains Writing Workshop

• Kitchen and Food planning — Get to know our kitchen processes and foods and help us maintain good inventory records, plan nutritious meals and menus, research new food possibilities, and find good deals on food purchases

• Grant seeking, grant research and grant writing

• Admin and Bookkeeping/Accounting

• Fundraising planning and brainstorming

• Donor outreach

• Social Media: Content creation; Organize and rally for peer-to-peer fundraising; Researching and tracking social media changes and trends to help us keep current on the latest best practices

• Video production — help us highlight the good people and programs at the WMC

• Photography, Image and Design Work — Graphic design work; Contribute to our photography database and help organize

• Website design and upkeep — Keeping a website current is a massive task with an organization that has as much going on as we do at the WMC

• Email Promotion — Help the WMC connect with our supporters by email

• Podcast — Join our team as we tell stories from the End of the Road

• Writing — Write and report on things happening at the WMC; Research and write on topics of interest to the WMC and supporters (anything environmental, off-grid living, rural Alaskan community, area history, technology and WMC culture); Research and write on history of WMC and KMXY community

• Volunteer organizing — Be a volunteer who helps to recruit and organize our volunteers!

Simple life, epic place, Real people

• Food — join us for delicious and nutritious WMC communal meals

• Programs — Discounted or free participation in summer programs (subject to availability)

• Community — integrate more closely w/ the WMC family

• See Results — Snag some good karma and be a part of an organization making progress toward doing real good in the world by cultivating an intentional and mindful engagement with wild spaces

Local fun and adventures:

• Hiking and Walks

• Alpine hikes with opportunities to see copper mines from a hundred years past

• River rafting

• Pack rafting

• Flightseeing in a little bush plane — highly recommended and free/discounted if you time it right

• Backcountry, fly-out trips — Discounted but still several hundreds of dollars. Well worth it if you can afford it and can coordinate the scheduling.

• Glacier hiking

• Ice climbing on the Kennicott Glacier

• Exploring historic Kennicott (run by the National Park Service)

• McCarthy-Kennicott Museum in downtown McCarthy — small but highly recommended

• The Old Hardware Store on the WMC campus also has a small library as well as an art room, and these are available for your use on a rainy day or a mellow morning.

• Socializing w/ locals at McCarthy restaurants like The Potato and The Golden Saloon, which are located a short walk from the WMC.

• Concerts and other local events

• Friday night community softball near to downtown McCarthy and WMC

• There is also a local swimming hole about a half mile from the WMC

• In addition to all of the above, there is a steady stream of activities hosted by the WMC: author readings, arts and science-oriented workshops, small living room concerts, and a storytelling festival, to name a few. The WMC also has a good guitar in the Old Hardware Store, available for any skilled musician to use.

– Mountains –

– wilderness –

– space –