The month of June is Great Outdoors Month and we are thrilled to feature an interview with Kelly Farrell–Chief of Interpretation & Program Services for Arkansas State Parks. With a nature-infused childhood, and higher education studies in social psychology and education, Kelly’s career unexpectedly blossomed with Arkansas State Parks after happening upon a temporary seasonal park interpreter position after college.

Taylor Studios (TSI): Kelly, thank you for taking the time to talk with us and share your expertise with our audience. Can you perhaps tell us a little about what inspired you to pursue a career in the outdoors?

Kelly Farrell (KF): Summers at Scout camp, weekend campouts with my Scout troop, backyard tent nights, long days spent outside building forts, climbing trees, and digging for worms…I am so fortunate that my parents not only tolerated outdoor interests, but encouraged them.  So much of my personal character was shaped by family support and the many opportunities Girl Scouting—especially summer camp—provided, including independence, confidence, collaboration with others, and curiosity about nature. It’s no coincidence that as an adult my motto is “Play outside often!”

TSI: How did you get to where you are today in your career?

KF: This is going to be a long story…but I’ve learned that interpreters tend to appreciate hearing it because many, like me, have wandered into this career.

I didn’t plan this path, but it’s turned out to be a terrific, star-lit journey in which each opportunity seems to present itself when the time is right. I studied social psychology and education in college, with every intention of pursuing a PhD in psych — most likely to do policy work and advocacy for the LGBT community. I wasn’t specifically called to church ministry–although I did explore that path–but I did feel strongly that I needed to be of service to others.

Before grad school I opted for a gap year to work on my GRE score and save some cash, taking a seasonal park interpreter position at Lake Ouachita State Park literally as “just a job.” I didn’t know anything about interpretation; quite simply, a friend told me about the job opening, it sounded cool, and it came with free housing, so why not?

Within days of starting, I’d already experienced several scary job-related emergencies (such as a woman falling off the tour boat dock into the lake, with injury, in freezing January temps). However, I’d also experienced quite a few of those priceless, amazing moments that are classics in this profession (like helping a senior citizen joyfully see his first bald eagle in the wild). By the end of my season I was hooked on all of it. I loved the adrenaline. The teamwork among park staff. The hard work. Getting dirty. Being in nature. Studying history. Being paid to research and read and write and think. Being of service to people AND to the planet. This job wrapped up all my academic interests, my love for the outdoors, and my passion for servant leadership.

I decided to stick with this awhile and see where it went. Upon landing a full-time interpreter job with Arkansas State Parks, at DeGray Lake, I stayed there almost six years. It’s a big, busy park year-round, and I was afforded numerous opportunities to grow my skills and explore professional interests, like coordinating large special events, implementing the park’s first kayaking and snorkeling programs, organizing group campouts, and more. I was also fortunate to have agency support for being involved in the National Association for Interpretation, and I loved attending their Region 6 workshops where I met many friends and mentors. I started writing articles for their publications, and eventually became a workshop presenter and elected board member, plus earned my Certified Heritage Interpreter (CHI) credential.

Many in our field know my mentor Jay Miller, who retired in 2012 as Chief of Interpretation from Arkansas State Parks, but is still professionally active as a consultant and President of the National Association for Interpretation. In 2004, he took a chance on me when I applied for the agency’s Field Interpreter/Assistant Chief of Interpretation job. I worked side by side with Jay for eight years, in which we coordinated statewide events, led interpretation planning, implemented several new programs, and led our department into a new era with the NAI models for interpreter training and certification. In that time I became I Certified Interpretive Trainer and Planner through NAI, a Certified Public Manager through the Arkansas Public Administration Consortium, and continued to be pleased with my path of public service.

In 2012, I was promoted to Chief of Interpretation & Program Services, the position I hold today. It’s a job I wasn’t sure I’d get but was pleased to be offered, as I believe I bring several important perspectives to our senior management team: I am the youngest as well as the only female. Based in the agency’s central office at the Capitol in Little Rock, I now evaluate and advise on park interpretation statewide. I also supervises our graphic design shop, providing oversight on all publications, trail signs, and exhibits.  I work closely with our Director as well as Operations, Marketing, and Planning Sections to advocate for quality interpretation throughout our system. In this job, I see myself as a canoe paddle – I’m always in the water to help with steering. Sometimes I do that gently and subtly, and other times more forcefully and quickly – but always I’m here to guide and advocate for the interpretation program in our system. It matters SO MUCH, to me and to staff, that I started in the field, out there on the frontline as a seasonal moving up through the system. It matters when, as a manager, I wear the uniform in solidarity with field staff. I want to be the kind of leader who works with the team, not above them.

So where am I today? Solidly grounded in an unexpected career that I love. I have no regrets about not (yet) returning to graduate school, as I’ve earned respected credentials, gotten to travel and speak all over the world, work every day with a team I love, and am doing work that matters. Sadly, now the Scout camps of my childhood are closed. Thus, I cherish devoting my career to this park system that aims to be in the “forever business.”

TSI:  What is the most challenging issue your organization faces?

KF: Like any big organization, our challenges are many. We constantly think about how to stay rooted in strong traditions while being innovative and relevant for upcoming generations. We could be better with our messaging and practices, both internally and externally, regarding diversity. We are always exploring ways to be more self-sustainable with our cash revenues, as public funding is ever-dwindling. Specifically in interpretation, we (like every other agency I know), struggle to measure effectiveness on attitude and behavior changes in our guests, as we try to inspire them toward conservation behaviors.

Having said all that, I think our biggest challenge, one that touches every employee at every level, is consistent communication. We are a large and sometimes unwieldy organization: We have 52 field locations and centralized administration—that’s about 1200 employees, many of whom are quite rural and work in the field away from desks and phones. Even with strong chain of command, clear organization of duties, standardization of procedures, and all the conveniences of modern technology, it can be exceedingly difficult for accurate, clear, two-way communication to occur on a large scale. Fortunately, we have a new Director and senior management team that have identified all these issues and are working on a road map toward solving them.

TSI: How do you determine what’s important to your visitors?

KF: We do our best to listen to them – they gladly tell us. In Arkansas we are different than many parks organizations, in that we are part of the state’s Department of Parks & Tourism, meaning we most certainly are in the hospitality business. There are definite standards for comfort, meeting guest expectations, and safety.

We have an active and responsive social media presence, we pay attention and reply to TripAdvisor comments, we listen to Friends groups, and we try to hold stakeholder meetings when major new projects are in the works. Further, we pay attention to industry trends – we can’t always afford or have time to conduct extensive studies ourselves, but have a responsibility to follow peer-reviewed journals, network with colleagues, and be vigilant about remaining open to new ideas while sticking to our mission.

TSI:  What natural site or museum (anywhere, anytime) has made the greatest impression on you? Why?

KF: I’ll mention two, since you asked about both:

The Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C. is the most profound museum experience I’ve had – of course not because it was fun, but it was respectful of its topic, well organized, deeply engaging and thought-provoking, and well-designed with sensitivity for needs of various audience members who might visit. I appreciated the overt call to action–literally on the windows of exit doors as visitors leave–imploring “THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU SAW – the next time you witness hatred, the next time you see injustice, the next time you hear about genocide.” As a compassionate human, I was moved by my experience here, and as a professional interpretive manager, I was impressed with their visitor experience planning and design.

As for natural sites: I love LOTS of places all over this world – and have been fortunate to visit many – but so far nowhere have I felt a more powerful sense of Americana, and of being small next to the landscape, as in Yosemite National Park. I hope this answer changes over time, because I plan to see more in this lifetime.

TSI: What’s your best advice for someone starting out in this field?

KF:

1. Keep your eyes and ears open. Tons of opportunities are out there if you’re paying attention and willing to pursue them – jobs, grants, professional development, hand-me-down equipment, even new friends and mentors.

2. You are essentially always interviewing. Commit yourself to kindness and excellence at all times. You never know when you’ll be interacting with someone who could influence the next steps in your career path.

3. Read constantly. Keep growing. Read novels, obscure magazines, blogs, the news. Mix it up. It’ll expose you to new ideas and help keep your mind and heart open.

4. See people. Really see them and appreciate them. Just like you can never step in the same river twice, every audience is new. Everybody you meet has a life story and it affects how they experience your park. Understand that some people may be very different from you, and it is your responsibility to acknowledge and overcome your bias. If you treat every day as fresh, and every new audience as real people, you won’t get bored and you’ll do a better job of respecting your guests. Your interpretation will be truly visitor-focused.

TSI: What is the most challenging aspect of your job?

KF: Limited capacity of time. There is just never enough time to do all I want to get done – and do it well. I definitely own the fact that I take on a lot, of my own accord, but it certainly can be exhausting. Keeping on top of all my assigned and elective projects, delegating but monitoring, spending enough time in the field at parks developing relationships with staff, dedicating time at the exhibit shop with my graphics team, being present here in the office.  It takes constant discipline with time and organization. I’m better some days than others.

I do take heart in John Muir’s words, knowing there will always be work and part of my task to find acceptance of that: “This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls.”

Having said all that, a subsequent challenge is finding work-life balance. I’ve found that although I love my work family—they are precious and I am rich (and I know plenty of people can’t say the same about their own work situation) — it is also super important to keep healthy boundaries. I am mindful about dedicating time at home with my family, and I intentionally pursue several outdoor hobbies on my own or with non-work friends, including an attempt to keep separation with social media. None of this is because I have anything to hide, but rather it creates a space in my life where I can totally step away sometimes. The more I can relax and rejuvenate when I need to, the more valuable I can be to my team at work.

TSI:  Which feature of your site has been the most popular among your visitors? Why?

KF: I think something we do well in our park system is keep Freeman Tilden’s concept of “the Thing Itself” in focus. This was so important to Tilden, author of Interpreting Our Heritage (1957), that he put it on PAGE 1 of his book: “Every year millions of Americans visit the national parks and monuments, the state and municipal parks, battlefield areas, historic houses publicly or privately owned, museums great and small…In most of such places the visitor is exposed, if he chooses, to a kind of elective education that is superior in some respects to that of the classroom, for here meets the Thing Itself—whether it be a wonder of nature’s work, or the act or work of man. ‘To pay a personal visit to a historic shrine is to receive a concept such as no book can supply.’”

Our agency maintains amazing historic structures, and we build comfortable, modern lodges, cabins, and visitor centers – but the feature our visitors come for is the Thing Itself. Each of our parks was established because of some striking natural resource or historical story. Our guests want to see nature on our trails, they want to camp in the forests or by the lakes or on top of the mountains, they want to fish and float the streams, they want to explore for themselves the places where history happened. Our park planning and design, when done well, encourages and facilitates those experiences. Then our interpretive efforts, done well, prompt guests to understand the “So what?!” of what things mean in our parks, how they fit together, and most importantly, WHY THEY MATTER. If we light a spark of wonder in our guests, ideally that flames up into self-driven learning, positive word of mouth publicity, return visits, advocacy, and protection forever.

TSI:  We’d love to help promote all that you and your site does; is there a book, blog, project, website, or anything else in which you’d like us to tell our readers about?

KF: Lots of our staff take turns contributing to the Arkansas State Parks blog, featuring stories on our interpretive programs and events, behind-the-scenes tours of special places around the state, and such.

http://www.arkansasstateparksblog.com/

Also, we’d love for our friends to follow us on social media, on the channels of your choice, and tag us when you visit the Natural State and have terrific experiences!

• facebook.com/StateParksofArkansas

• instagram.com/arkansasstateparks/

• https://twitter.com/arstatepark

• youtube.com/user/ArkansasStateParks

• pinterest.com/arstateparks/