Summary

Description

This Action Plan has been prepared to support Recommendation 11 of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Refuge Systems Conserving the Future. The plan outlines a new mentoring program for Friends partnerships within the National Wildlife Refuge System. The new plan, building off of the former national friends mentoring program developed 15 years ago, recommends an expanded mentoring approach to address the needs of a larger and growing Friends program. The investigations of this subteam concluded that the best longterm solution to maintaining strong and viable Friends partnerships is to develop a new mentoring program that addresses the priority needs of Friends Partnerships. The new approach keys on four goals: 1 address the priority partnership needs of both the Friends and Service; 2 engage all levels of the Service in mentoring activities; 3 capitalize on the expertise within our own Friends community to mentor and coach; and 4 decrease response time for the delivery of mentoring visits.