Hi everyone!  

My name is Seneca Humphries. As the Community Youth Development Lead at the Trust, I had the special job of co-leading the Trailblazers youth crew along with Rosie Clark for the summer 2026 season. Launching in 2024, this third season of trail work added over 900 hours of public land stewardship to a total of more than 2800 hours completed by young conservationists from Charlottesville to Shenandoah.

Thanks to the generous support from our donors, the Trust able to support 2 crew leaders as they managed, supported, and educated 8 interns from the Community Attention Youth Internship Program (CAYIP) on everything from self-advocacy in the workplace to best practices for cutting off small branches while considering tree health.  

From east to west, this summer’s crew wrapped up an adventure-packed 6 weeks working on trails all around the city like Heyward Community Forest and Riverview Park. They started off the season with a bang as a heat wave hit Charlottesville with record highs that taught them how to know their own bodily limits and stay hydrated on trail. 

Conditions that would’ve kept most people inside, these young conservationists persevered and began their first week at North Grounds behind UVa’s Darden School learning how hydrology and human psychology are central to trail building theory. They benched in (trail speak for creating a new trail) through a site that was previously blocked off by construction and cut back overgrown plants from nearly a year of disuse on the inaccessible trail. On Thursday, the crew finished their first week and discussed their plans for the Fourth of July, ending the week on a positive note when Tommy Safranek, on behalf of the Rivanna Trail Foundation, brought cold smoothies to the crew.

 

 

This work kicked off a summer of classic trail maintenance tasks like corridor clearing to ensure hikers, bikers, and walkers alike could use the space, weedwhacking and brushcutting to widen the tread and protect trail users from overgrown poison ivy, ticks and other critters on the brush by the trail.  

In addition, the crew installed 10 signage posts across Pen, McIntire, and Quarry Parks that make the outdoors more accessible by ensuring trail users with all outdoor experiences can easily navigate the trail.  

Side Note: Our constant companions this summer were the 10 rubber ducks who made their home on the van’s dashboard, each named and assigned a group mission statement or value by a crew member.

In Week 3, the crew loaded up our van and headed into the park for a 3-day camping trip at Big Meadows. Between playing a card game we dubbed “evil Rummy” and dodging summer afternoon rainstorms, we spent time alongside the Shenandoah Youth Corps assisting the NPS trail crew with their trail widening project by carrying heavy logs and gravel up the steps. This project is part of an important expansion effort at Dark Hollow Falls, one of the most heavily travelled trails in the park, over several years to widen the log ladder staircase.

 

As this program approaches its 4th season, the Trailblazers program arose from a community need to introduce new audiences to the outdoors, develop a skilled workforce committed to preserving natural spaces, and to bridge the gap between America’s youth and the natural world. And it is doing just that.

I was especially encouraged by one of the crew members, Carter Morris, a rising senior at Charlottesville High School who shared that he specifically wanted Trailblazers as his CAYIP placement site because of his interest in environmental studies and figured trailwork would be a good test of his interest.

At the end of the season, he explained that the boots-on-the-ground conservation work from the summer confirmed his desire to study environmental engineering and interest in learning more about positions with the National Parks Service.

“It’s been an experience where I’ve gotten to meet new people and it has prepared me for something I might do outside of school. [Becoming  a Trailblazer] means a lot and it has done a lot for me.” -Carter Morris

His work ethic and curiosity about the ‘why’ behind trail maintenance made him stand out as a future champion for Shenandoah. It was a pleasure to see the growth of these crew members in their professional skills, self-confidence, friendships, and work ethic over the past 6 weeks.

Next step: exploring the opportunity to expand the youth crew program into other counties bordering the park, so teens like Carter can play an active role in preserving local natural spaces now and into their future careers.