Sarah Myers loves the great outdoors.
“I love the sense of history you get in the forests,” says the 33-year-old, who’s based in Hot Springs, South Dakota. “I love the idea that these trees have been here for generations and they’ll outlive me.”
It’s fitting, then, that Myers works as a forester in federal land management planting trees, helping young trees grow and managing commercial timber sales.
Getting into forestry, however, is not easy. She spent years proving herself before she found a sustainable job. Here’s what it took to get hired.
‘Expect about six to eight years-worth of seasonal positions’
While studying natural resources and conservation for her undergraduate degree at Cornell, Myers had a mentor who explained what she’d need to have on her resume if she wanted to work for the federal government.
“She mentioned to expect about six to eight years-worth of seasonal positions,” says Myers. Forestry requires experience doing field work, which by nature is often seasonal.
So after she graduated, from 2013 to 2017, Myers took on seasonal positions, including summers in Virginia, Maine and South Dakota and winters in Arkansas, Arizona, New Mexico and in Alaska, “which was fabulous,” she says. She often worked on forest inventory measuring tree characteristics like species, age, height and diameter.
But the positions were tough.
“Seasonal work is hard because you’re not settled anywhere,” she says. “You’re living out of suitcases and what you can move in your car. You’re constantly applying. Pretty much as soon as you start one job, you’re thinking about the next one.”
And they don’t pay much. “The seasonal jobs tend to be entry-level positions,” she says. “I was making about $15 an hour,” which she had to stretch as long as she could because there was no guarantee she would get hired again.
‘It’s exactly what I want to be doing’
Myers finally landed her first permanent position in Colorado in January 2018.
“I was still making the same $15 an hour,” she says, “and it took me six hours away from home. So I was actually paying rent in two places, one place during the week, one place on the weekends.” But at the very least, “it made the potential of making this a career feel real.”
She received her master’s degree in geographic information science and cartography in 2020 and was hired for her current position of supervisory forester in September 2022. In 2024, she brought in $92,100, including overtime pay.
“The position I’m in now feels like it was made for me,” she says. “It’s exactly what I want to be doing.”
As far as her advice to anyone who wants to follow a similar work path, “the field is interdisciplinary,” she says. “Learn as much as you can from the hydrologists, wildlife biologists, fuels specialists, etc., and help them accomplish their goals, too.”
“There’s no such thing as ‘that’s not my job'” in the position, she says.
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