A Brief History
Nearly two decades ago, a group of visionary natural resource professionals recognized the value of developing a standardized training program for natural areas managers in Florida. These enterprising individuals convened a group of experienced land management professionals representing numerous agencies and organizations to summarize the expertise and skills they believed job candidates would need to be competitive for jobs in their respective agencies and organizations, which was then packaged into a series of multi-day workshops. To meet the demand for trained personnel, the Natural Areas Training Academy was developed to deliver these workshops through a partnership of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and the University of Florida IFAS Extension.
