Employee Profile - Focus on Youth

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Sophia Berrey, Brad Johnston-Cox

Park Rangers (Seasonal)
Bishop Field Office

Sophia Berrey, a third year undergraduate student studying biology at UCLA, was looking for a summer job where she could work outdoors near her home town of Bishop, Calif.  She is an emergency hire at the Bishop Field Office and finds it to be the most interesting and the best match of any other jobs she had been looking at.  As a park ranger, she patrols BLM campground and collects camping fees, replaces signs and performs other minor maintenance duties throughout the Owens Valley.  Although this is her first exposure to federal employement, her mom says she really likes it.  Sophia obvioulsy is an outdoor person, enjoying skiing, hiking, rock climbing, and exploring.  Oh, and she likes yoga and reading, too.  An avid skier, at 16, she qualified and competed in the downhill at the Junior Olympics.  She will be studying at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, this next academic year and will be a volunteer at the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Brad Johnston-Cox is a seasonal hire who started with BLM as a volunteer three years ago at age 17.  He liked his volunteer experiences so much, he decided to major in recreation management/eco-tourism at the University of Montana in Missoula, where he will be entering his sophmore year.  As with Sophia, Brad is from Bishop.   This is his second summer as a park ranger, where he monitors and patrols wilderness areas and provides resource restoration in the Bishop area.    When not on the job, he is usually enjoying some activity outdoors such as Alpine climbing, road biking, running and fishing.   He has three sisters and one brother.