Desert Wildlife Intern Aster Schaefer reflects on internship

Aster (left) sits at the Coalition’s outreach table with Jonni Zeman (right) at the Cooper Center for Environmental Learning’s 60th anniversary event.

Aster Schaefer joined the Coalition as a Desert Wildlife Intern in Fall 2024 and continued for an additional semester. They were instrumental in uploading incoming photos from our Oro Valley camera project to the Wildlife Insights database to share with researchers and students around the world as part of our regular data management workflow.

While learning wildlife species identification, Aster also helped train the Wildlife Insights species identification AI. In addition, Aster participated with our native seedball workshops and community outreach events, and incorporated their work into some of their school assignments and projects.

Aster shared about their experience that “My time at the Coalition has been full of laughter. The sunlight, made golden from the lacquered wood floors, greeted me many Friday mornings, as would the wildlife when I booted up the intern laptop and checked through the Google Drive for the Oro Valley camera project. Later on, others would trickle in with comments about their morning, some bit of local news, or the amount of caffeine present in—or absent from—their systems. The otherwise quiet identification of wildlife would be peppered with conversations about related and unrelated topics throughout the day, and the long quiet moments in between were softened by the music emanating from my Bluetooth speaker. As compelling as identifying wildlife is, I also appreciated that such work was punctuated by lunches, tabling events, and even, on one occasion, the opening of an exhibition at the Desert Museum’s art gallery.

When I began in August of last year, I did not expect to continue into 2025, yet somehow the funding and the grace of the staff allowed for me to continue another semester’s length. Of the several internships that I have completed, this has been one of the most enjoyable and well-run, and I know that the other interns who may be accepted into this program will have a fantastic time. Of the many animals I came to know, my favourite remains the elusive mountain lion (Puma concolor), of which I have seen absolutely none [among the recent photos uploaded for the project].”

Thank you Aster!

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