Experience

Nighthawk's primary work experience comes from his four summers spent as a wilderness expedition guide in the Adirondack Mountains. While working for Camp Fowler, a youth camp affiliated with the Reformed Church of America, Nighthawk led kayaking, canoeing, sailing, and backpacking journeys primarily through the Siamese Ponds and West Canada Lakes Wilderness Areas. Nighthawk also worked as a nature counselor and lifeguard on the waterfront at the base-camp when not leading tours through the wilderness. Nighthawk's experiences at Camp Fowler have provided some of the greatest joys and friends in his life as well as a significant research experience. A case study he conducted in 2005 of Camp Fowler campers' environmental awareness and support for conservation initatives contributed significantly to Nighthawk's senior thesis for Princeton University, "The Cry of the Loon".

During the summer following his freshman year at Princeton, Nighthawk sought employment at an environmental advocacy NGO, Environmental Advocates of New York, in his home city of Albany, NY. While learning a great deal about the public policy process, environmental issues, and how to conduct research, this position also taught Nighthawk that he would never again seek to hold a 9:00-5:00 job in which he showed up to work each day in a 3-piece suit. As Nighthawk's first real job (working the counter at a gas station that plays the Country Music Station non-stop can hardly be considered a real job), his work at Environmental Advocates taught him that he wanted his life work to focus on caring for creation, but through a different means.

After graduating from Princeton University, Nighthawk, seeking to continue working in non-traditional environments, obtained employment with Nature's Classroom, at the Lakeside, Connecticut site. His three months in this seasonal position as an "environmental educator" only intensified Nighthawk's love and enthusiasm for teaching, for the environment, and most of all, for teaching about the environment. Since his time at Nature's Classroom, Nighthawk has worked for several school districts in the Albany area as a substitute teacher in the fields of science, English, mathematics, and history. Nighthawk's favorite subjects to teach, however, are the non-traditional ones such as theatre, where he can feel free to use eight minutes of class time reciting Poe's "The Raven".

"damnant quod non intellegunt"
(they condemn what they do not understand)