George Wright Society :: Parks, Protected Areas Cultural Sites

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The George Wright Society champions stewardship of parks, protected & conserved areas, cultural sites, and other kinds of place-based conservation by connecting people, places, knowledge, and ideas. By uniting people from many different backgrounds around a common passion for protecting Earth’s natural and cultural heritage, we create the collaboration needed to meet today’s greatest conservation challenges.

INNOVATING ACROSS BOUNDARIES FOR
Parks • Cultural Sites
Protected / Conserved Areas

University of Montana, Missoula • October 20–23, 2025

Plan to join us as we launch a new series of annual workshops exploring the latest in place-based conservation!

Check out the workshop program — and we‘re still accepting proposals for Posters

GWS ParkForum 2025 1-min Intro

GWS ParkForum 2025 1-min Intro

Check out the latest issue of our open-access journal, Parks Stewardship Forum

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INSPIRED BY GEORGE MELÉNDEZ WRIGHT

The first-ever biography of our namesake — the visionary who revolutionized management of America‘s national parks

“Emory’s enumeration of Wright’s accomplishments—including a survey of wildlife in Western parks, the first of its kind—is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Highly recommended for nature lovers and park enthusiasts.” LIBRARY JOURNAL

Watch our virtual chat
with author Jerry Emory!

Parkwire, GWS’s daily global digest

of park news • Follow on FB

Latest top headlines • 8 August 2025

A judge has temporarily stopped the construction of the so-called Alligator Alcatraz migrant detention camp inside Big Cypress NPres. https://buff.ly/Z7LzhcS

Trump's cuts to USNPS have left remaining staff struggling to do several jobs at once just to keep the parks open per Burgum's order. https://buff.ly/C7l1LbF

A judge ruled that Trump's sudden cuts to humanities-related grants are illegal, and a lawsuit seeking redress can move ahead. https://buff.ly/xWudE5h

Trump canceled a Biden-approved wind farm in Idaho that sparked controversy because it was near Minidoka NHS, the site of a WWII Japanese American internment camp. https://buff.ly/d8f2qSn

The main glacier in Argentina's WH-listed Los Glaciares NP is now shrinking quickly, a new study says. For years the glacier was considered a rare example of one not affected by climate change. https://buff.ly/l6iaV7h

The Ramsar Convention, the principal international treaty on wetlands protection, met in Zimbabwe last week. Politics soon took center stage, with Russia becoming the first nation to withdraw from the treaty. The US skipped the meeting until a delegate finally showed up and issued a string of Trump administration demands, which were not accepted. https://buff.ly/t3jbh8e

A new study documents that over 10,000 species worldwide are "critically endangered" — the most dire category. But it also found that conservation actions really help. https://buff.ly/wzUOsFe

A free IUCN webinar on "The State of the Ranger" worldwide is on tap for June 30 at 2:00pm Central European Summer Time (8:00 am Eastern Time). Register at https://engage.iucn.org/event/vital-sites-webinar-state-ranger-celebrating-contributions-rangers-global-conservation

The Interior Department is greatly expanding the potential areas of its workforce that are targeted for RIFs, or firings. USFWS national wildlife refuge employees and others in the agency are part of the new targets. https://buff.ly/RwAGlll

As expected, Trump's EPA administrator announced that the administration will seek to revoke the legal ruling that allows it to regulate greenhouse gases — potentially the most significant move Trump can make to destroy progress on climate change. https://buff.ly/BcO8vdz

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