In the third and final year of USDA’s Natural Resources Field Skills and Leadership Development, CSC teamed up with up NMFWRI’s monitoring team, Albuquerque Wildlife Federation, NMHU’s Department of Forestry and local landowners to serve community college students from Las Vegas, Santa Fe and Denver in an immersive 10-day field course. Students learned a suite of skills and implemented a three-day research project in pairs, culminating in capstone presentations. This project is aimed at reinforcing the commitment of junior college students towards completing their four-year degrees.