Environment
Young conservationists advise DNR on kids’ interests
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By ELIZABETH FERGUSON
Capital News Service
LANSING — Students passionate about the environment can help the state provide outdoor recreation for their generation while learning more about Michigan’s natural resources. Applications for the state’s Youth Conservation Council are available on the council’s website and will be accepted until April 30. “If we are going to sustain world-class resources, you have to have people that care about them, and so how do you get the next generation to care about them?” said Keith Creagh, director of the Department of Natural Resources. The Youth Conservation Council was created in 2013 to bring the next generation’s conservation leaders — ages 14 to 18 — together to discuss how the DNR can increase young people’s interest in Michigan’s outdoors, according to Ray Rustem, the Youth Conservation Council’s adviser. The 25-member council includes students selected from across Michigan to give the DNR insight into the interests of kids in all areas of the state.