Yosemite, CA…Yosemite National Park is proud to announce the 2018 recipients of the park’s Volunteer of the Year awards. These prestigious awards are bestowed annually to outstanding volunteers in nine different categories for exemplary service to Yosemite National Park. In 2017, Yosemite National Park hosted over 10,734 volunteers who donated over 139,500 hours to help with a wide variety of volunteer projects. This annual award ceremony is held each year as part of Yosemite’s celebration of National Public Lands Day, and in conjunction with the Yosemite Facelift park-wide cleanup event.

These awards were presented in person at a special awards ceremony in Yosemite Valley on September 29, 2018.

The 2018 Award Recipients are:

Doug Simmons, Preventive Search and Rescue, Individual Volunteer of the Year

Emily Wilson, Yosemite Archives, Individual Youth Volunteer of the Year

Kathy Hopkins, Yosemite Conservancy, Enduring Volunteer of the Year

Carmel Middle School, Volunteer Group of the Year

Golden Gate LINC Program, Youth Volunteer Group of the Year

Katie Patrick, Yosemite Bear Management, Volunteer Supervisor of the Year

Vegetation and Ecological Restoration, Yosemite Volunteer Program of the Year

Sam Webster, NatureBridge Service Instructor of the Year

Harrison Hood, Facelift Volunteer of the Year

This award ceremony was held in conjunction with the 15th annual Yosemite Facelift, a park-wide clean up event. This year, over 2,000 volunteers, including over 400 youth volunteers, came to Yosemite and provided over 11,000 hours to help clean up trash throughout the park. Over 14,000 pounds of trash was cleaned up from Yosemite National Park. We thank the Yosemite Climbing Association, Yosemite Conservancy, and all of our volunteers for coming out and helping with this great event.